Ecobank Sort Code for Your Branch in Nigeria

Ecobank does not publish its branch sort codes anywhere we could read, and neither does the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) or the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS). A wrong code on a form does more harm than a missing one, so get yours from the bank or from your own cheque leaf, and leave the lists alone.

Who to ask at Ecobank

Ecobank makes this easier than the other banks we looked at. Its branch directory for Nigeria, one of the downloads on Ecobank’s Nigeria page, gives each branch’s address and, for most of them, a named contact with a phone number and an Ecobank email address. There are no sort codes in it, but it puts you in touch with the people who can give you yours.

Ask for the branch that holds your account, which may not be the one nearest to you. That is also the code to use for a transfer, taken from the branch that holds the account the form is asking about. If that branch has closed or moved, do not reuse its old code from memory or from a list. Ask which branch holds your account now, and what its code is.

The other route is the Ecobank Assist page, which offers contact by phone or online at any hour. Pick Nigeria from its country list, ask for the sort code of your account’s branch, and have the account number to hand. We found no Ecobank page saying that its app or its USSD menu shows the code.

Where it sits on an Ecobank cheque

The CBN’s cheque rules make the sort code part of every cheque. Its guidelines describe a line of numbers printed in magnetic ink near the bottom of the leaf, which can carry the bank’s routing number, the account number and the cheque number. The group of nine digits beginning 050 is your sort code.

Ecobank sort codes for Lagos, Abuja and other cities

No city has a single code. Each branch has its own, but the city fixes part of it. The CBN’s standards on bank account numbers set nine digits: three for the bank, two for the state, three for the branch and a check digit worked out from the other eight by a set formula. The bank’s three are 050, according to the CBN’s paper on the account-number scheme. That is only the bank code, not the sort code.

So a branch in Lagos should have a code that starts 050 15, in Abuja 050 08, in Port Harcourt 050 21 and in Uyo 050 01. The test catches obvious mistakes in a code you are given. It does not prove the code right.

These state codes are the CBN’s and apply to branches in Nigeria only, so they tell you nothing about Ecobank in Ghana.

The Ecobank list that gets Delta and Benin wrong

A sort code list still copied around the internet shows nine of Ecobank’s Delta State branches with Adamawa’s state code, all five of its Benin branches with Delta’s, and the Port Harcourt branches under Plateau. Codes like those had to change after 7 November 2018, when a CBN circular told every bank and NIBSS that each branch’s code must carry the code of its own state, and that banks which kept using another state’s code would be sanctioned.

Nobody outside the bank can tell you which codes were replaced. A list that is mostly right is the dangerous kind, because nothing about it looks wrong.

Ecobank Nigeria’s head office and branches

The bank trades as Ecobank Nigeria Limited, with its head office at Plot 270B1 Ozumba Mbadiwe Avenue, Victoria Island, Lagos. It counts more than 250 branches and over 60,000 agency banking locations. By its own account, the last bank it took over was Oceanic Bank. For a branch’s address, use the directory or Ecobank’s branch and ATM locator.

For an account elsewhere, see our pages on sort codes at Union Bank, Sterling Bank and FCMB.