Please dear Nairalanders I want to understand why banks chose to destroy ATM cards that got trapped in their machines if the card is not of their bank but release those of their banks.
For example, Ecobank will destroy Zenith bank ATM card trapped in their machine but will release trapped Ecobank card.

Its a CBN policy. The policy is to guard against unauthorised fraudulent use of trapped cards.
It states that own bank cards should be collected by the customer within 24 working hours and destroyed after that if uncollected and other bank cards should not be returned to customer but destroyed immediately and returned to the other bank.

Nutase:
Its a CBN policy. The policy is to guard against unauthorised fraudulent use of trapped cards.
It states that own bank cards should be collected by the customer within 24 working hours and destroyed after that if uncollected and other bank cards should not be returned to customer but destroyed immediately and returned to the other bank.

Ok, thanks for that but that policy is too harsh. Most ppl affected by this are genuine card holders. They should let ppl present evidence of ownership and the card released.
Someone who stole an ATM card will hardly come for it if trapped in a machine