The recent Series of Credit Card Frauds on Indian Consumers happening in different parts of the World didn’t go well within the RBI. The Regulator acted Swiftly and setup an Inquiry and upon the findings have released a set of Regulations which empowers Indian Credit Card Customers. We have a Copy of RBI’s Circular – RBI/2012-13/424 DPSS (CO) PD No.1462/02.14.003 / 2012-13 and the excerpts of the same are as follows,
- All New Debit and Credit Cards to be issued for Domestic Usage within India Only.
- Customers have to make Specific Request for the Credit / Debit card to be Valid for International Transactions. All Such Cards must be issued with EMV Chip and PIN Based in case of Debit Cards. Deadline – June-30-2013
- Banks must convert all Magstripe Cards of Customers who have used their Cards for International Transactions (including e-commerce / Online Shopping) to EMV based Cards. Deadline – June-30-2013
- All the active Magstripe international cards issued by banks should have threshold limit for international usage. The threshold should be determined by the banks based on the risk profile of the customer and accepted by the customer (By June 30, 2013). Till such time this process is completed an omnibus threshold limit (say, not exceeding USD 500) as determined by each bank may be put in place for all debit cards and all credit cards that have not been used for international transactions in the past.
- Banks Must Provide its customers an option to Block Cards by SMS and acknowledge the same as RBI has received Complaints from Consumers that the Bank was not Blocking Credit Cards.
- Bank should frame rules based on the transaction pattern of the usage of cards by the customers in coordination with the authorized card payment networks for arresting fraud. This would act as a fraud prevention measure (By June 30, 2013). Banks should build in a system of call referral in co-ordination with the card payment networks based on the rules framed
- Indian Card Issuing Banks should move towards real time fraud monitoring system at the earliest. Banks should move towards a system that facilitates implementation of additional factor of authentication for cards issued in India and used internationally.
In my view, these are the best set of Recommendations the RBI has given empowering Customers on how they can customize their Cards – Like I need International Shopping Option but with limit of just $300 or maybe in-call verification of the transaction etc. Blocking Card by means of SMS a great move as Banks have been really arrogant in Blocking Cards as soon as the Fraudulent transaction is detected because the onus then lies on the Banks to prove that the Charge was Genuine.