‘No Plan To Increase UTME Fee’ – JAMB Denies Reports

EKO HOT BLOG reports that the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has rubbished the reports that it has increased its Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) fee ahead of next year’s exercise.
Addressing the viral claims in a statement made available to newsmen on Wednesday, Public Communication Advisor of JAMB, Fabian Benjamin, noted that the recent perceived fee increase resulted from the board’s cashless policy and not an actual increment.

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Benjamin clarified that the cost of obtaining the board’s UTME application documents remains N3,500, the same price since it was reduced from N5,000 in 2018.

Despite the challenging economic situation in the country, the cost of application documents has not been raised, reflecting the board’s commitment to providing affordable services.

“Consequently, the Board wishes to assure the general public that it has been doing all within its powers to ensure that candidates are not overburdened in any way. One of these measures is to deliberately keep costs low hence its decision to make available its Use of English reading text free of charge through a QR code to ensure that the increase in cost of production is not passed to candidates.

“Therefore, all UTME candidates would access the reading text free of charge through multiple channels, which include their profiles, e-mail address, notification slip and the Board’s website.

“It is, however, pertinent to state the fact that what is being perceived in some quarters as an increment in its fees is nothing other than the fallout of its cashless policy through which all fees payable by candidates to CBT centres have been consolidated and are paid along with their application fees to prevent their wanton exploitation by unscrupulous centre owners.

“These fees are in turn remitted to partnering centres on a weekly basis. For instance, candidates are expected to pay N700 for registration, N1500 as examination fees and N1500 for the optional Mock-UTME at privately–owned centres,” he added.

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Fabian also mentioned that the Board will now collect the registration fee of N700 from candidates, along with N1500 for sitting the main UTME and N1500 for the optional Mock-UTME. This collection will be done on behalf of the CBT centres.
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