Raiffeisenbank Scared of Ukrainian Swindlers
Raiffeisenbank held up servicing its cards through cash machines located in Ukraine, responding to a surge in fraudulent operations with plastic cards in that country. Ukrainian bankers say the fraud outburst happened last fall, besides, banning card operations won’t prevent swindlers from withdrawing money in a neighboring country.
“We have temporarily suspended servicing our cards via cash machines in the territory of Ukraine,” Alexander Koloshenko, member of Raiffeisenbank board, told Kommersant, emphasizing that the bank hopes it will be able to resume access already this week. Currently the clients may withdraw money in the banks. In Ukraine, the fraudulent operations, including the PIN code compromise, have recently become more frequent than anywhere else, said Koloshenko.
The Ukrainian bankers rebuff Raiffeisenbank accusations. “The level of fraud via plastic cards in Ukraine in 2004 couldn’t be called large, it was bellow Poland and Romania,” said Alexander Kuchmenko, head of the plastic card department at Finance & Credit bank. The minor surge in fraudulent operations in Ukraine was spotted “in August-September of the past year,” the official said.
The bank applied to Visa and MasterCard to find the source of the crimes. Jointly, they revealed fraudulent operations peaked past October in Ukraine. “The problem has come to naught to-date,” Koloshenko explained, pointing out that the bank could have spotted it only now as the clients themselves don’t at once notice fraud in the statement of account. Investigation carried out by the bank takes time as well. “As a result, a few months may pass till the bank decides whether to make up for the operation for its own account,” Koloshenko said. “So, when the refunding increased to certain amount, we have taken appropriate actions.”
Still, the actions taken by Raiffeisenbank to cut short the fraud via cash machines appear a bit strange. If a bank denies transaction authorization via a cash machine, no money could be withdrawn by using its card in Ukraine. But to make a false card, one needs only to insert a card in the cash machine and press PIN code. Whether he will be able to get money or not is of no importance, as it could be withdrawn in the neighboring country, for instance, in Russia, a banker told Kommersant on condition of anonymity.
Raiffeisenbank representatives said the bank asked to inform the clients about the situation with card usage in Ukraine and for the safety’s sake, started, for its own account, replacing the cards for all those visited that country. Most of Russia’s bank officials interrogated by Kommersant are sure it is better not to use plastic cards in Ukraine at all. The respective recommendations to the clients have been issued by Impexbank, Expobank and others. Such point of view is not shared in Moskomprivatbank (subsidiary of Ukrainian Privatbank). Leila Filipovskaya, head of the card department at Moskomprivatbank said some cases of fraud in Ukraine were spotted, but not so many to recommend clients to stay away from the cash machines in Ukraine. Visa, MasterCard representatives declined to comment. However, Kommersant learnt Visa intends to release the respective information to the clients today.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Mar. 15, 2005
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