Online shopping scams are the order of the day due to the rise of electronic commerce. In 2022, the Bank of Spain doubled the volume of claims received for fraudulent digital payments made with credit cards or transfers. These incidents currently constitute the main source of complaints from consumers.. Users demand greater security in online transactions to protect their data from cyber attacks such as the one suffered by Air Europa this Tuesday, which asked affected customers to request the cancellation of their cards.
The Bank of Spain has recently published its annual Complaints Report, corresponding to the year 2022, in which it summarizes its conflict resolution activity between financial entities and clients.. Last year, the banking supervisor registered a total of 34,146 complaints, of which almost a third were motivated by allegedly fraudulent payments in which users reported not having authorized the operation or having been victims of deception and, therefore, requested the return of lost money. 86.1% of the claimed operations had been made through credit cards, while the remaining 13.9% had been made through transfers.
Specifically, there were 10,361 complaints filed against fraudulent digital payments, more than double the 4,955 registered in 2021, when they were already the main focus of complaints, replacing mortgage loans.. In the last four years, fraud claims have multiplied by eleven, since in 2019 they barely exceeded 900. The Bank of Spain recognizes that this type of discrepancies between consumers and financial entities are one of the main causes of the increase in complaints, since the banking supervisor has gone from dealing with less than 15,000 appeals annually in 2019 to exceeding 34,000 in The last two years.
The institution directed by Pablo Hernández de Cos attributes the increase in complaints to the rise of online commerce and the use of digital payment methods after the pandemic.. According to a survey on purchasing and consumption habits carried out by the Organization of Consumers and Users (OCU), the proportion of people who make online purchases has grown considerably in recent years. Clothing is the most popular product in online purchases. 60% of the population is now encouraged to buy it this way, compared to 16% who did so in 2017. They are followed by technological devices and large household appliances, which 58% and 52% of the population also purchase online.
Despite the significant growth in fraud claims, the Bank of Spain clarifies that the cases investigated barely affect 0.01% of the more than 102 million credit and debit cards in Spain at the end of 2022.. According to a survey by the banking supervisor, cards are the second most used means of payment in Spain, behind cash. A third of the Spanish population uses them daily and the proportion reaches 48% among people between 25 and 34 years old.
47% not admitted for processing
The processing of the more than 10,000 fraud claims registered by the Bank of Spain has not always been satisfactory for users. In fact, 47.1% were inadmissible, in most cases because the banking supervisor understood that the impact was not in the authorization of the payment itself, that is, in how the financial institution executed the operation, but in the circumstances in which this occurred.
An example of these rejected claims would be the online booking of tourist accommodation that ultimately turns out to be fraudulent, so the user demands a refund of the reservation charge from their bank.. “In these cases, the authorization of the operation is not questioned, but rather the reason for the dispute focuses on the actions of the commercial establishment or the individual to whom the payment was intended, because it would not have complied adequately,” argues the Bank of Spain. .
Something similar has happened with complaints in which the consumer questions the validity of an operation because it was authorized by a third person who would have obtained their banking information through deception or fraud.. “In these cases, the payment service provider would have acted in accordance with the regulations that regulate this matter, as the operations had been authenticated with the required security elements,” says the banking supervisor, who does not rule out, however, that said claims may have legal proceedings.
Protect users
“When you have a problem with your bank, the first thing is to complain and, if the entity does not solve it, it is escalated to the Bank of Spain, which is the previous step to go to court,” they explain from the Association of Financial Users (ASUFIN). ), which demands security improvements from banks in the face of the “alarming” growth of fraud in online payments. The consumer defense association recalls that the Payment Services Law prevents banks from refusing to return the money without proving that there has been serious negligence or bad faith on the part of the user.. This rule states, for example, that the consumer is exempt from liability for unauthorized online payments when the bank card has been lost or stolen as long as it has been notified “without delay.”
“Entities often resort to consumer negligence, when many times it is their systems that have been hacked,” they report from ASUFIN.. “The number one responsibility is, on the part of the entity, to have security systems robust enough to stop any attack and keep our data and funds safe,” they insist.. The consumer defense association points out that an improvement in the protection of user data would help reduce the number of complaints and, therefore, litigation in the courts.
