ATM withdrawal-fee hike ‘oppressive’–lawmakers
lAWMAKERS on thursday slammed the “oppressive” increase in interbank automated teller machine (ATM) withdrawal fees that the country’s 58 million cardholders are set to shoulder starting April 7; even noting that indigents, senior citizens and disability pensioners will bear the brunt of the increase.
Makati city rep. luis Jose Angel n. campos Jr. said while indigents, senior citizens, disability pensioners who are receiving cash transfer from the government through the land Bank of the Philippines (landbank) can always withdraw their money free of charge from any landbank ATM, many of them actually end up using the nearest machine of another bank, mostly to save on transportation costs.
“thus, they will be forced to cough up the P18 fee per withdrawal transaction,” said campos, a member of the House committee on banks and financial intermediaries.
campos said landbank’s 2,188 ATM terminals comprise only 10 percent of the national network of cash dispensers.
landbank ’s cardholders include the 4.4 million families under the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program and the bulk of the 3.1 million combined pensioners of the Social Security System and the Government Service Insurance System.
the 1.8 million national and local government employees are also landbank cardholders.
campos earlier urged the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to defer the increase in withdrawal fees. “It is a bad time for banks to be nickeland-diming pandemic-weary Filipinos amid the massive job losses and soaring food prices,” he said.
For his part, rep. Michael t. Defensor of Anakalusugan said banks should use some of their excess capital to enlarge their ATM networks, instead of punishing cardholders with higher user fees to fund their expansion.
the banks now have plenty of surplus capital amid the decline in lending due to the covid-19 pandemic, Defensor said.
“In fact, one bank is so awash with capital, it is paying out a record P18 billion in special dividends to shareholders next month, even after setting aside P41 billion in reserves against potential bad loans,” Defensor said without naming the bank.
“they clearly have the money to build up their ATM networks without having to add to the burden of cardholders who are already saddled with miscellaneous bank charges,” Defensor said.
Banks are poised to simultaneously jack up their interbank ATM withdrawal fees—mostly to P18 per transaction—on April 7.
Most banks are currently charging only P10 to P11 per transaction, with no more than five exacting between P12 to P15.
Financial intermediaries need the extra fee income to grow the national ATM network, which currently has only 21,762 terminals, according to the Bankers Association of the Philippines (BAP).
“But in reality, users will have little or no choice because, based on our survey, at least 10 of the biggest banks that dominate the national ATM network are already set to evenly impose the P18 fee,” Defensor said.