How to Find Your UBA Sort Code in Nigeria

Look along the line of numbers at the foot of a cheque leaf from your account. The group of nine digits beginning 033 is the sort code of the branch that holds that account.

Without a cheque book, ask UBA’s Customer Fulfilment Centre on 0201 280 8822 or 0201 280 8800, or at [email protected]. These are the details on UBA’s contact page. Ask for the sort code of the branch holding your account, and have the account number ready. Nobody needs your PIN or password to answer that.

The branch that matters is the one holding the account, which may not be the one you walk past every day. If it has closed or merged, ask which branch holds the account now.

What the nine digits mean

033 15 XXX Y

The first three digits are the bank: the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) gave UBA 033, and that alone is the answer if a form asks for the bank code. The next two are the state, here 15 for Lagos. XXX is the branch, and Y is a check digit worked out from the other eight. The format comes from the CBN’s account-number standards.

How a UBA code starts in each state

There is no one code for Lagos or Abuja, only a shared beginning. These five digits come from the state codes in a CBN circular to all banks, which says a branch must carry the code of the state it stands in.

That gives you a quick test for a code someone has handed you. It should have nine digits, and the first five should match the branch’s state. A Port Harcourt branch beginning 033 15 is wrong. A code that passes may still belong to the wrong branch, so the test only catches the careless mistakes.

Is there a full list of UBA branch codes?

Not one we would send you to. UBA’s FAQ and help pages do not carry one, and we could not trace the branch lists in search results back to UBA. The CBN’s order on state digits came in November 2018, so a code copied from before then may since have changed. The trouble with those lists is that a wrong code looks exactly like a right one, and only UBA can settle it. UBA’s FAQ does not say that its app or its Leo chat assistant shows the sort code either, which leaves the cheque leaf and the contact centre.

Transfers and payments from abroad

An ordinary transfer inside Nigeria runs on the 10-digit account number and the bank’s name. UBA’s FAQ says as much about its U-Pay payroll service: in Nigeria, an employee needs only that number. If a form still insists on a sort code, it wants all nine digits, not 033 alone. The USSD code people call the “UBA transfer code” is another thing altogether: *919#, UBA’s banking short code.

A payment from outside Nigeria goes by SWIFT code. UBA’s FAQ and contact pages do not print a SWIFT code, so get it from the contact centre and not from a directory site. These digits also apply to UBA in Nigeria only. Its branches in Ghana, Kenya or anywhere else run under their own countries’ systems.

Sort codes at other Nigerian banks

Every commercial bank follows the same pattern, with its own first three digits. The CBN’s list gives GTBank 058, Access 044, First Bank 011 and Zenith 057. We have separate guides for Ecobank sort codes, Sterling Bank sort codes and Union Bank sort codes.