Consumer ire puts ATM charges on hold

22:19' 15/06/2008 (GMT+7) VietNamNet

After first announcing that all ATM transactions would be charged a minimum fee of 1,000 VND starting in July, the Vietnam Bank Card Association has now reconsidered its plan following questions about the current state of ATM services and infrastructure.

An ATM of the Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank)ATM cardholders began speaking out against the policy almost as soon as it was announced, claiming that the poor quality of most banks’ ATM services did not merit their collecting additional charges.

“If banks get fees from customers, they have to ensure good services. I don’t feel happy with the fact that at the moment sometimes ATMs don’t work properly,” said Nguyen Van Hung, construction engineer in Hanoi.

Many customers such as Nguyen Quoc Viet, a construction workers from Hanoi , say they face difficulty in finding an ATM at the end of month to get their salaries.

Students who often use the ATM as a means of receiving money from their families are vowing not to use the service anymore if fees are charged. “If the bank does so, it changes the contract with customers. Having to pay fees makes students’ lives more difficult,” said Tran Van Phu, sixth year student from Hanoi ’s Medical University.

The plan to charge fees has been delayed until the infrastructure is in place to improve ATM service quality, said the chairwoman of the Vietnam Bank Card Association, Nguyen Thu Ha. The association will propose to the State Bank the specifics on fee collection, but is not ready to choose a date for implementation.

The Government has been pushing business and agencies to move from paying salaries in cash to using banks and paying through ATMs since the beginning of 2008. Charging fees right now could work against this effort.

Right now only about 10 percent of Vietnamese people use bank services like ATM cards or credit cards, reported the MCKinsey company.

There are now about nine million cards in-use out of which 4,500 are ATM cards. An additional problem is that each ATM system only accepts certain kinds of cards. To help alleviate accessibility problems, banks are joining forces.

“With the present scale of the problem, it is very difficult for any bank to do it alone. So co-operating is the best way to improve the situation,” said Nguyen Duc Huong, general director of Lien Viet Bank. Banknetvn and Smarlink have officially operated their bank alliance for the last five months. With this new alliance, owners of cards belonging to Vietcombank, Vbard, BIDV, Vietinbank and Techcombank can do their transactions at ATMs.

By the end of March, the amount of ATMs of the five member banks had gone up to 3,614, accounting for 64 percent of the total machines in the market.As planned, by the third quarter of 2008, Banknetvn and Smartlink will cooperate to increase the number of machines to 4,500.

VietNamNet - Consumer ire puts ATM charges on hold

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Washington Pays Youth Workers with Prepaid Cards

ePaynews.com Jun 24 2008 :

The Washington, DC, Department of Employment is using prepaid debit cards to pay the wages of 19,000 workers participating in a summer youth employment scheme.

The 2008 Passport-to-Work Summer Youth Program offers young people an opportunity to work on a temporary basis in a wide range of occupations. The 10-week program is offered to young people living in DC who are aged 14 to 21.

The prepaid Visa cards are issued by JPMorgan Chase as part of its Payroll debit card program, which was first launched in 1987. Processing for the cards is also provided by JPMorgan.

The cards can be used at the point of sale or at ATMs with a PIN. They are reloadable and will be funded twice a month during the 10-week program.

“We hope the real-life experience gained by using payroll debit cards to budget and purchase items will help these students become responsible for their own finances,” says Dr Natwar M. Gandhi, chief financial officer for the District of Columbia.

Another advantage of the cards is that, by not incurring check-cashing and bank account fees, they will save the workers money, Gandhi says.

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Mexican Issuers Leverages Canadian Gift Card Software

ePaynews.com

Jun 20 2008 : Mexico’s Mercadotecnia, Ideas y Tecnologia (MIT) is launching a gift card program using software developed by Toronto-based Smart Processing Solutions.

MIT will use the SmartIssuerPro system to provide gift cards which will be issued by its clients.SmartIssuerPro enables independent sales organizations (ISOs), financial institutions, retailers and processors to issue and manage prepaid, debit, gift, and loyalty card programs in-house.MIT provides transaction switching services for Mexican banks, retailers and payment networks.

Smart Processing Solutions provides processing and switching software for banks, ISOs, processors, acquirers and retailers. In Canada, its software is used to drive a network of around 11,000 non-bank ATMs.

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