The Vietnam Banks Association has urged international card organisations to reduce several types of fees on Vietnamese banks in the context that the COVID-19 pandemic negatively affected their card businesses.
Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - TheVietnam Banks Association has urged international card organisations to reduceseveral types of fees on Vietnamese banks in the context that the COVID-19pandemic negatively affected their card businesses.
The association said that thepandemic significantly affected the operations and business of banks in Vietnam,including card businesses, in recent months.
It cited statistics that thevalue of transactions by cards in the domestic market in the first three monthsof this year saw a drop of 21 percent while in foreign markets by 28 percentagainst the same period last year.
Value of repayment to cards inApril tumbled by 78 percent against the same period last year and 93 percentagainst March.
At some companies andorganisations which accepted card payments, including aviation, education,tourism sites and hotels, the value of transactions fell by 80 percent in Marchagainst the previous month and further declines were predicted in coming months.
Thus, the association urgedinternational card organisations Visa and Mastercard to reduce the fees onVietnamese banks for at least 12 months.
Specifically, the associationproposed the transaction fees to be cut by at least 50 percent for both bankswhich issued cards and received payments.
For the long-term, it wascritical to have appropriate policies for fee collection to promote thedevelopment of Vietnam’s card market.
The association said that Visaand Mastercard were collecting three to four types of fees for eachtransaction, adding that the fees international card organisation werecollecting were much higher than those of card switching organisations./.
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Illustrative image (Photo: thebank.vn) 
