What to do to avoid losing money when paying by card?

To avoid losing money when swiping cards at acceptance points such as restaurants, shopping malls..., Dr. Bui Quang Tin gives 6 important notes that users need to pay attention to.

Many card users today face risks from transactions via POS machines, and the recent incident that attracted public attention was the Australian customer paying by card.at Nightfall restaurant, District 1deducted up to 39,429 AUD (about 683 million VND). To use the card safely, dBelow are the shares of Dr. Bui Quang Tin, Faculty of Business Administration, Banking University of Ho Chi Minh City related to this issue.

Payment cards, especially credit cards, are one of the most convenient and popular products around the world. In Vietnam, the number of card users has been increasing day by day. Payment through POS machines (card payment acceptance machines) at card acceptance units is also becoming simpler, employees only need to swipe the card into the machine, enter the PIN number (only in some cases, usually for domestic debit and credit cards), enter the amount to be paid, then sign the receipt and sales invoice to complete the process.

According to regulations, employees at transaction points must be responsible for comparing the customer's signature with the signature on the card to protect the rights and limit risks for cardholders.So to avoid losing money when swiping your card at acceptance points such as restaurants, shopping malls..., here are some things that customers need to keep in mind.

Dr. Bui Quang Tin points out 6 important notes to limit risks when using cards.

Sign up for SMS or email for transaction notifications

SMS Banking is a text message service provided by banks to users when they open a transaction account.After registering for this service, customers will receive a text message via the mobile phone number registered with the bank when a transaction occurs while using the payment card at retail units such as restaurants or shopping malls.The goal is to check transaction information promptly after customers swipe their cards at the transaction location, especially checking account balances after transactions.

Therefore, to ensure safety when using the card, customers should register to use the balance change service via SMS (fee under 10,000 VND per month) to conveniently track transactions made from their card.In addition, users can use balance, location and transaction time notifications via email registered with the bank, usually the bank will not charge for this service.

In addition, customers can also check their balance after transactions using software provided by the bank when using their mobile phone (the software is free to download and the service fee is usually free).

Monitor the card swiping process

With on-site payment transactions, currently in most supermarkets, restaurants, hotels, shopping malls... the cashier does not give the machine to the customer to swipe, but they will directly hold the card and make the transaction. This poses a great risk of fraud, the employee can take a photo of the card information at any time, because only information about the cardholder's name, card number, start date, card expiration date and CVV/CVC number on the card is needed to make online transactions.

In fact, many cardholders have lost money even though they followed the safe card usage process. Therefore, when using a card to pay for goods and services, cardholders should directly observe the staff swiping the card and should not hand the card to them to go to the POS machine to swipe the card. They should also ask these staff to pay using the card's chip reader if the customer's card is a chip card and check the information on the paper slip printed from the POS machine.

During the process of card payment via POS machine, if the PIN number is entered incorrectly or the card does not have enough limit, the machine will notify through a small paper slip (sale slip) printed from the POS machine, which is one-third the size of a normal slip (when the bank has approved the transaction). Therefore, customers need to keep the payment card in sight and check the above information when making transactions at POS machines.

Use the bank's card locking or unlocking service

Currently, many banks allow users to call the card center's switchboard to lock the card when there is no need for a transaction and reopen the card when a transaction is needed.

Therefore, in order to protect their legitimate rights, customers need to cooperate and provide the bank with the most complete information to lock/unlock their cards promptly and conveniently.

Regularly update bank notifications on card payment risks

To avoid unfortunate incidents happening to customers' accounts, recently commercial banks often issue warnings and recommendations to customers when making online transactions, transactions at ATMs, POS by sending text messages, emails...

Therefore, updating and paying attention to these warnings will help customers a lot in transactions using payment cards. In particular, these are services that banks do not charge customers.

You should read the payment card usage contract carefully.

One of the recommendations of the Competition Management Department, Ministry of Industry and Trade recently after cases related to loss of money in payment accounts or bank cards that have attracted attention and interest is that customers need to carefully study the card service contract provided by the bank to them.

When considering this service contract, customers need to pay attention to the regulations on the rights and responsibilities of the cardholder as well as the card issuer. Normally, the cardholder's obligations are always twice as much as the benefits. Meanwhile, the rights of the card issuer are usually three times as much as their obligations. Therefore, the customer's interests will be damaged if they do not research and discuss with the bank about the unfavorable terms...

In case the user does not understand much about the contents of the contract, he can ask relatives or friends who understand banking law or ask a lawyer for support. The cost incurred depends on the way the customer chooses to review the contract.

Customers have the right to sue in court.

During use, if a dispute arises, the cardholder can file a lawsuit in court to protect his/her legitimate rights according to the law.

The card provision contract also clearly stipulates that in case of dispute between the cardholder and the card issuing bank, the priority will be to resolve the dispute by conciliation. If unsuccessful, either party has the right to request the competent authority to resolve the dispute in accordance with the provisions of Vietnamese law, that is, through commercial arbitration or a competent court.

However, this is a time-consuming and costly way for customers to recover their lost money in cases where they are not at fault or have less fault than the bank. On the other hand, this litigation is only used whenHave used all 5 methods above but the risk still occurs.

According to VNE