If you have ever borrowed money from a loan app in Nigeria and millions of Nigerians have, you already know the darker side of digital lending. The threatening calls, the messages sent to your contacts, the embarrassing broadcasts on WhatsApp. The interest rates that seemed reasonable on Monday and catastrophic by Friday. The fees buried in fine print that nobody explained to you before you clicked “Accept.”

For years, this was simply the price Nigerians paid for quick access to credit. Regulatory gaps meant that loan apps could operate with almost no accountability and many of them did exactly that.

That era is now over!

The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) issued the most comprehensive set of consumer lending rules: Digital, Electronic, Online, or Non-Traditional Consumer Lending Regulations, 2025.  This is not a guideline. It is not a suggestion. It is binding law and it gives you, the borrower, more legal rights than you have ever had before in Nigeria’s digital lending space.

This blog explains every one of those rights in plain language and tells you exactly what to do when they are violated.

What Are These Regulations and Who Do They Cover?

The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission is Nigeria’s primary consumer protection agency, established under the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act 2018. It has the power to make regulations, investigate complaints, impose fines, and revoke licences of businesses that exploit consumers.

The rules apply to a wide range of operators, including loan apps, Fintech’s, mobile money operators, agricultural platforms extending inputs on credit, retailers offering instalments, and even telecommunications companies. The Regulations apply to all applicable transactions involving unsecured loans, including any form of lending to consumers either by way of cash, airtime, data, cashback, services, or barter in exchange for specific or verifiable monetary value, regardless of how value, charges, or interest components are calculated or derived.

Rights available to you as a borrower

Below are some of the rights borrowers have as contained in the new law: Digital, Electronic, Online, or Non-Traditional Consumer Lending Regulations, 2025.

The Right to full disclosure before you borrow

This is perhaps the most foundational right the 2025 Regulations establish. Digital lenders are now required to disclose the terms of any loan agreement to consumers before the transaction is completed, and loan agreements must be communicated in a manner that ensures the average consumer is fully aware of the terms and any layman can understand the terms.

In practical terms, this means every lender must clearly tell you before you accept any loan:

• The exact interest rate and how it is calculated
• The total repayment amount not just the principal
• All fees and charges including the processing fees, late payment penalties, rollover charges
• The repayment schedule
• The consequences of default
• Any changes to terms and how you will be notified

Note: If a lender did not disclose all fees and charges before you accepted the loan, if hidden charges appeared after disbursement that lender has violated your rights. You can file a complaint.

The Right to protection from harassment and shaming

This is the right that millions of Nigerians have been waiting for. The abusive recovery tactics used by some loan apps calling your employer, broadcasting your debt on your contact list, threatening you with arrest or publication of your photos are now expressly prohibited by law. The Regulations include a ban on harassment and shaming of borrowers.

Note: The moment a loan app calls your contacts, sends your information to a WhatsApp group, or threatens to expose you they have committed a regulatory violation. You are not powerless. You have legal recourse.

The Right to data privacy and cybersecurity protection

The Regulations mandate cybersecurity systems to prevent data breaches and unauthorized access. This tackles long-standing concerns about borrower information being misused or leaked, and aligns Nigeria’s consumer credit practices with global standards of data governance.

Note: If you discover that your personal information from a loan app has been shared, sold, or leaked you have a complaint against both the lender (with the FCCPC) and a data protection complaint with the Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC).

The Right to fair and transparent interest rates

The FCCPC will monitor interest rates to prevent exploitative charges. While the 2025 Regulations stop short of imposing a rigid interest rate cap, they do require that rates be consistent with what was advertised.

The Right Not to Be Lent Money You Cannot Repay

This is a right that surprises most borrowers but it is real. Lenders must approve loans only for borrowers able to repay, and are required to carry out adequate credit assessments to ensure that borrowers are capable of repaying loans sustainably.

The Right to no unsolicited loans or marketing

The Regulations prohibit pre-authorized or automatic lending and ban unethical marketing.

This means that a lender cannot automatically disburse a loan to your account without your specific, informed request and consent nor bombard you with unsolicited loan offers via SMS, WhatsApp, or push notifications without your consent

The Right to deal only with registered lenders

All digital lenders operating within Nigeria must be duly registered and licensed by the Commission. This means you have the right to verify before you borrow, that the app or platform you are dealing with is legally authorized to lend money in Nigeria. An unregistered lender has no legal standing to enforce a loan agreement against you and is itself operating in violation of the law.

If a lender has violated any of your rights under the 2025 Regulations, here is exactly what to do: screenshots of all communications calls, SMS, WhatsApp messages, in-app messages, screenshots of your loan agreement and the terms displayed to you at application, Bank statements showing disbursement and any deductions, evidence of any harassment saved voicemails, screenshots of messages sent to your contacts and any communications where the lender threatened you or made demands

In conclusion, for years, Nigeria’s digital lending sector operated in a regulatory grey zone and some lenders used that gap to build businesses on the exploitation of borrowers. The harassment, the shame tactics, the hidden fees, the debt traps all of it thrived because there was no clear legal consequence.

The DEON Consumer Lending Regulations 2025 change the equation. The law now says clearly: you have rights, lenders have obligations, and violations have consequences.

But a right you do not know about is a right you cannot enforce. Now that you know use it wisely!

For further enquiries

Email: info@verazadvocates.com

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