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'State banks won’t charge 'top-up fees' to customers'

The Association of State-Owned Banks (Himbara) has stated that it will not charge additional fees on their customers’ e-money cards, following complaints regarding the central bank's plan to charge "top-up fees" to customers.   

News Desk (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, September 19, 2017

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'State banks won’t charge 'top-up fees' to customers' Electronic money (e-money) cards are prepared for distribution at a Mandiri branch in Jakarta on Sept. 18. State-owned lender PT Bank Mandiri is preparing to issue 3 million e-money cards, only days before Jakarta motorists will be required to make cashless transactions to pay for toll road fees. (Antara/ Rivan Awal Lingga)

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he Association of State-Owned Banks (Himbara) has stated that it will not charge additional fees on their customers’ e-money cards, following protests regarding the central bank's plan to charge "top-up fees" to customers.   

“We at Himbara agree not to charge top-up fees,” the president director of state lender PT Bank Rakyat Indonesia (BRI), Suprajarto, said in Jakarta on Tuesday as reported by kompas.com.

By freeing their customers from paying top-up fees, Suprajarto said, Himbara banks were encouraging their customers to actively use the e-money cards in their daily transactions.

Read also: BI criticized for burdening consumers with e-money top-up costs

Meanwhile, Bank Indonesia (BI) executive director for communications Agusman stressed that the central bank's draft regulation on e-money cards was being discussed by the BI board of governors.

“Preparations to issue [the regulation] are still under way,” he added.

Agusman said he did not know of the legal basis for the state lenders' decision to not charge top-up fees to their customers, because the regulation on e-money transactions was still under discussion.   

Earlier, Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI) chairman Tulus Abadi had criticized the central bank for its plan to require consumers to shoulder the administrative and maintenance costs for the e-money cards through the top-up fees, saying that such a strategy would hinder the development of a cashless society.

Tulus had said the banking sector would benefit from the emergence of e-money, and because they already covered costs from the sales of e-money cards, he had argued that banks should be responsible for the costs of topping up the cards. (bbn)

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