‘DOING A GOOD JOB’
EMV compliance of their ATMs, POS terminals and clients’ cards.
“What has been challenging in our environment is the replacement of debit and ATM cards because of sheer volume. Based on our estimates, we are talking here of about 76 million cards that need to be replaced. So that is going to be a challenge,” said Mr. Espenilla.
Emmanuel A. Tuazon, senior vice-president and head of Marketing Group of PSBank, agreed to this, saying that it is in the replacement of cards in circulation that banks do fi nd themselves lagging behind.
“However, it is needless to say that all banks are prioritizing this initiative and is fully enforcing the shift to EMV cards not only to comply with BSP Circular 808, but more importantly to protect our clients,” Mr. Tuazon said in an e-mail to BusinessWorld.
All cards that PSBank issues to its new clients are now EMV chipcapable. The bank’s existing account holders have also been offered with replacement cards for free since the start of the year.
“The local banking industry has moved as a whole to make this possible. The EMV migration is a big milestone for local banks and a lot of preparation has been made to make this a success,” Mr. Tuazon added.
For his part, Philippine National Bank ( PNB) Senior Vice-President and Chief Marketing Officer Norman Martin C. Reyes, in a recent interview with BusinessWorld, said that the EMV adoption — a two-pronged concept involving issuing and acquiring — is truly a complex undertaking for banks, as it is time-consuming and immensely expensive.
“But because we are very cognizant of the risks to our customers and we want to safeguard their interests, we are adopting the EMV chip technology,” he said.
According to Damasen Paul C. Cid, PNB vice-president and head of Electronic Channels Division, PNB started issuing EMV- equipped cards to its customers in October last year. “PNB is currently in the middle of recarding, or issuing EMV- enabled cards to clients who still have the magnetic stripe cards. All of our ATM units are EMV-compliant.”
PSBank’s Mr. Tuazon believes that the BSP’s move mandating all banks to migrate to the EMV chip card technology is a “win-win scenario” in the fight against fraud of both financial institutions and the banking public.
“However, banks should not be complacent with the adoption of EMV technology. That is why even with EMV, PSBank continuously monitors developments and assess risks that may be a threat to us and our clients. Technology continues to evolve over time and so is the ability of fraudsters to manipulate the infrastructure we put in place,” he said.
While these challenges are everpresent, Joel D. Tirona, PNB assistant vice-president for Electronic Channels Division, said the Philippines is doing a good job, specifically in its migration to EMV. The country, as Mr. Reyes put it, is actually ahead of some industrial countries like Japan, which is not yet required to adopt EMV.
“Given that most of the banks have started already, and the customers have started going to the branches to get their replacement cards, the chip cards, we can say that customer adoption is already picking up for the Philippines,” said Mr. Cid, adding that the EMV also allows for the future adoption of a technology that will enable better payment methods that are much easier and more convenient for customers.
“In a way, it teaches the cardholders of what is the potential of the card. It enables more things later on so people can get comfortable with the technology… Because of the chip, they probably adopt more digital- enabled services,” Mr. Reyes said.