Paying with a bank card is much more convenient than cash, and it takes up almost no space in your wallet - unlike a pile of change and a stack of bills. In addition, today non-cash payments are possible not only in stores, but also in public transport, and very soon it will even be possible to withdraw money from your personal account at store checkouts. But still, in some cases, experts recommend forgetting about convenience and paying with “cash”. We tell you in what situations paying by card can be unsafe.

The card does not belong to you You are paying abroad

You are shopping online

Are you an entrepreneur?

You pay for an order from a dubious establishment

The card does not belong to you. Under no circumstances should you pay with someone else's card - even if it belongs to your spouse, mother or son. Of course, if you do not want to sort things out with law enforcement officials. The fact is that if the cashier notices a discrepancy (for example, you are a man and you are paying for a purchase with a card registered in a woman’s name) and asks for a passport, according to the instructions, he must call the police to the store. And the security will not allow you to leave the retail outlet until the law enforcement officers who arrive at the scene find out who you are and where you got the other person’s card from.

You are paying abroad

In September 2018, a law came into force in Russia that allows banks to block customer cards if the money transfer seems suspicious to the operator. And first of all, these include transactions for an amount that is atypical for the cardholder or transfers made in an uncharacteristic place for him, for example, in the territory of another country. And as you yourself understand, staying abroad without a bank card is not the best prospect. Advice: prepare for trips outside of Russia in advance: call the bank and notify them of your departure. In this case, it is better to play it safe once again than to find yourself without a livelihood in a foreign country.

You are shopping online

Paying for purchases in online stores, especially unverified ones, is very dangerous. Firstly, the site may turn out to be a phishing site - with the help of such scammers deceive the owners bank cards all the necessary data, and especially inventive ones even “fake” popular resources so that you can’t tell the difference. Secondly, if a card is “lit up” on the Internet at least once, it is possible that its details will fall into the hands of criminals, which means that the money stored on it can be stolen at any time. In order to protect yourself, banks advise using a separate card for online purchases, to which you will transfer only the amount that is needed for the purchase right now. Another option is to get a special virtual card.

On the back of any bank card there is an inscription that the card can only be used by the person whose name and signature are indicated on it. But situations where a husband and wife pay with each other’s credit cards are widespread. Let's take a closer look at these circumstances. How legal it is to use someone else’s bank card and what the consequences are for violators.

Where is the ban on the use of cards by third parties stated?

There is no law prohibiting the transfer of a registered or unnamed card to another person. This issue is regulated by internal and departmental documents. The cardholder's obligation to keep confidential information secret and not to transfer the plastic media to third parties is contained in:

• on the reverse side of the payment instrument;
• in the contract;
• in the Conditions for issuing and servicing cards;
• in other documents that each client signs before starting cooperation with a credit institution.

The conditions for violating agreements are also spelled out there. The ban on using someone else’s bank card is provided for by the Rules of International Payment Systems and the Central Bank’s Memo “On measures for the safe use of bank cards”, distributed among clients of credit institutions.

Responsibility for using someone else's card

The agreement with the bank and the Terms of Service provide for the client's actions in the event of third party access to information about the PIN code or card details. If these facts are revealed, the holder must:

• urgently notify the bank using any of the available methods;
• block the plastic media through Personal Area, mobile app or by calling hotline financial institution.

For violation of the agreement, the Bank has the right:

• block the card;
• take measures to remove it;
• suspend or terminate expense transactions while maintaining the ability to top up your account.

Thus, if it is discovered that the card has been transferred to another person, the plastic holder may completely lose access to his money until the end of the proceedings.

Important! Eat legal way providing another person with access to cash on the map. The account holder can issue additional cards for wife, husband, children and other citizens.

Criminal penalty

This type of offense falls under Art. 159.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation - “Fraud using payment cards”, introduced in November 2012. The punishment provided for in the article is chosen by the judge from the following options:

• fine up to 120 thousand rubles;
• arrest up to 4 months;
• restriction of freedom up to 2 years;
• earnings of the convicted person for a period of up to 1 year;
• compulsory work up to 360 hours;
• correctional labor for up to 1 year;
• forced labor for up to 2 years.

Due to the loyalty of banks to their customers, criminal prosecution of cardholders and people close to them in the absence of damage is usually not applied. However, you should not forget about its existence. The injured party may be credit institution, as the owner of a bank card.

We hope that this information will be useful to all users of our resource and will eliminate the temptation to use someone else’s card, even for a very close person.

Today it has become so common to pay for purchases made in stores using bank cards that fewer and fewer people use wallets.

However, such convenience can sometimes backfire. Many examples from life show that it is not always worthwhile to rely too much on cards.

Let us describe a completely typical situation. The wife went shopping with her friends, taking her husband’s bank card with her. Is there any difference here with cash?

At first glance, there is not the slightest difference - except that the option with a card often looks even preferable for some women (since you can spend significantly more). However, in such cases, lawyers recommend taking cash from your spouse.

By presenting a bank card issued in your spouse’s name at the checkout, you are actually trying to pay with someone else’s card. At least that's how it might look from the seller's side.

Here it can be argued that, according to the provisions of the Family Code, all funds that spouses receive during marriage are theirs. common property. Accordingly, they belong to both of them. The same applies to the money that is credited to bank cards.

This is true, but there are also features of the application of banking legislation, which states that debiting funds from a client’s account is possible only on the basis of his own order.

Without such an order, the write-off of funds is allowed only in certain strictly specified cases: in accordance with a court decision or order of a bailiff. However, the use of bank cards by a spouse is not provided for among such exceptions.

Therefore, refusals of retail outlets in such situations to accept other people’s cards for payment are completely legal. Here we can give a typical example from judicial practice (according to the decision of the Central district court Kemerovo in case No. 2-8448/2015).

Having gone to the supermarket to buy groceries, the citizen collected the necessary purchases and went to the checkout to pay. Having started to put the groceries into bags, he gave the cashier a bank card for payment.

The cashier refused to accept the card given to her, since it could not belong to this buyer - it contained female data, and the buyer was a man.

The citizen stated that the card was issued to his wife, who is disabled. Since his wife has difficulty walking, he buys groceries himself. The money on the card belongs to his wife, who gave him the card and gave him the PIN code to make payments in the store.

The cashier responded by refusing to accept the card for payment, citing the relevant instructions from management. The citizen, in turn, decided not to give in and refused to remove the required amount cash at the nearest ATM.

The store security staff became involved in the conflict. As a result, the man was detained and the police were called. The arriving police drew up a report on the attempted theft of food from the store.

The citizen was taken to the nearest police station, and then he also had to appear before a magistrate. Fortunately, he was able to explain the true circumstances of the case, so the charge of petty theft was dropped and the case was dropped.

After this, the citizen, in turn, decided to go to court, accusing the store of causing moral damage due to the refusal to accept his wife’s card for payment. But the court did not support him, considering the cashier’s actions completely legal.

Although the law does not directly prohibit the use of spouse cards, the court indicated that a bank card is a personal payment document , the right to use which exists only with the owner of the bank account linked to it.

IN banking rules there is also a direct prohibition on transferring the PIN code by the cardholder to third parties, including relatives. If the fact of such a transfer is discovered, the bank has the right to decline responsibility for the fate of the funds in the account.

Consequently, the law does not provide for transactions using a card if it is presented not by the owner, but by another person.

Therefore, when visiting a store with your spouse’s card, you should prepare in advance for the possibility of ending this trip at the police station.

Over the year, the share of Russians paying for purchases only with bank cards has grown by more than a third – from 11 to 15%, a MasterCard study showed. The share of those who are willing to pay only in cash also decreased sharply: from 54 to 38%.

59% of the Russian population actively use bank cards, paying for purchases with them once a week or more often (an increase of 13% per year). Among the main incentives for cardholders to pay more often without cash, cardholders list convenience, high payment speed, security and the opportunity to receive a discount or bonus, the study says. Most often, cards are used in super- and hypermarkets, convenience stores and online stores, the survey showed.

The MasterCard survey included Russians aged 25 to 45 living in cities with a population of 250,000 or more. The sample consisted of 1021 people.

This trend is confirmed by Central Bank statistics. In 2015, the number of payments by individuals on cards increased by 27.8%, and turnover on them by 11.9% in volume, according to the annual report of the Central Bank. In the total number of transactions using payment cards specific gravity non-cash payments in 2015 increased by 7.3 percentage points to 74.7%, in the total volume - by 6.1 percentage points to 39.5%. These figures include information about payments by legal entities, but the Central Bank clarifies that the bulk are payments for goods and services by individuals.

Banks also confirm the growing popularity cashless payment. “People pay more with cards because financial literacy is increasing, the acquiring network is developing, salary projects, loyalty programs. As a result, people get used to cards and stop being afraid of them,” says a representative of Home Credit.

An important factor is the development of infrastructure for accepting cards not only in large cities, but also in the outback, notes Nikita Ignatenko, head of development of card products of the B&N Bank group: “Cards today are already accepted by many small stores located in small towns. populated areas" The development of card infrastructure was also facilitated by legislative changes - the obligation of retail outlets to accept cards, he recalls.

The convenience of making payments leads to an increase in the frequency of purchases, agrees a representative of Sberbank. And a card with additional functions gives customers additional income or bonus ( savings cards, space card, cashback), adds the monitoring director e-business Alfa Bank Alexey Golenishchev.

Considering that people’s salaries are not increasing, but prices are rising, bank clients are increasingly using limits on credit cards, Golenishchev points out, “it is more profitable to pay by credit card non-cash, since the withdrawal fee credit funds At an ATM, any bank charges a commission.”

People aged 25–45, residents of large cities with above-average salaries, are the most active in paying with cards, says Ignatenko.

The share of customers using the card only for purchases has grown from 25 to 73% over the past five years, says Alexey Shchavelev, director of the cross-selling department at OTP Bank. He points to two main reasons for this growth: increasing financial literacy of the population through gaining experience in using financial products and increasing the share of service and trading enterprises that accept plastic cards to pay for goods and services.

Who refused the non-cash payment and explains how it improved his life.

The use of bank cards is beneficial for banks, but not for ordinary citizens, and especially for entrepreneurs. Why do I think using cash is better?

To begin with, I want to say why people using plastic cards is beneficial for banks and why they are so carefully imposing them on us. Just remember how often managers of various banks call you and offer their super products: credit cards, installment cards, just bonus cards etc. Probably often.

For example, literally two days ago the manager of a well-known bank called me and offered me a super installment card for which I do not need to pay annual maintenance, you can make purchases in installments in certain stores and not pay a penny in interest. During the conversation, a logical question arose: what are the benefits of the bank? To which the manager replied that all interest costs are borne by the stores where purchases will be made. I said well, but everything can’t be completely so smooth.

In the end, I got at least some truth from the caller. The installment plan can be, as far as I remember, for 4 and 6 months, respectively, you will need to make payments in equal installments (the total amount is divided by the number of months of installments), and if you are late in payment by at least 1 day, then you will receive, roughly speaking, a fine ( I think there is no need to explain what fines for late payments in our banks). Such a delay will extract a decent amount from you and ruin credit history least. And a week earlier another bank called me and very intrusively offered me credit card 100 days without interest.

So what is the benefit of banks?

Everything is very simple. Firstly, this is an annual service, commission for Money transfers, in some cases, for cash withdrawals, as well as for SMS alerts.

Secondly, we pay with a card in the store and seem to pay only the amount indicated on the price tag. But it is not so. The fact is that the bank does not take interest from us for the purchase, but the store pays plastic card gives the bank from 1.5 to 3%, i.e. For every purchase of 1000 rubles, the bank will take away from 15-30 rubles, and this is a considerable amount for large chain stores.

Plus, the store must install a special terminal for bank cards; usually, installation and maintenance of terminals are free, but not always. Entrepreneurs will also pay for a current account, which is necessary to make non-cash payments. Thus, stores are forced to include these costs in the cost of goods, i.e. Again, we, ordinary buyers, pay for all this.

Many people now think that if one person out of a thousand refuses cards, this will not change the system in any way. That's not what I'm trying to achieve. Switching to cash opened up the opportunity for me to save money.

Another reason why I use cash is the fact that I see how I pay in the store, how the amount of money in my wallet decreases and on a psychological level it forces me to lead a more frugal lifestyle.

I don’t encourage anyone to give up cards, because it’s really convenient and safer (the likelihood of losing money or having it stolen is reduced). I will say more, I use one card, a salary card, because... my employer can only pay me money on my card. Only I immediately cash out money from the card and leave the amount on it to pay for housing and communal services, Internet and mobile communications, it’s just easier to pay for these services with a card. And my employer pays for the annual maintenance of the card.

And more reasons

A couple more arguments that also influenced my decision to give up plastic. Again, I repeat - this is everyone’s business and I do not encourage anyone to do the same. Everyone has their own head on their shoulders.

The first and most painful, card blocking. More and more often we hear stories about how Uncle Vasya’s card was blocked for transferring 1000 rubles. There are many such stories and the amounts are different everywhere, as are the reasons why the bank blocks the card.

I withdraw my entire salary from the card and walk around with cash. Not because it’s more convenient for me, but because this way I have more confidence that the money won’t be blocked at the most necessary moment. For those who want to say that somewhere in a gateway everything will be taken away from me, it’s possible, but I don’t carry large sums of money with me and I don’t walk around gateways.

The second reason - bailiffs. It started with Sberbank. So from the card of my friend, who used this bank, the amount of the fine was withdrawn and the unpaid transport tax, and for some reason they withdrew an amount of double size. He tried to return this second half for about 2 months, I don’t like this prospect of using cards.

Many now thought, yes, that’s what he needs, taxes need to be paid, etc. Just answer yourself honestly, which of you pays the transport tax and what should you pay it for? For a suspension that was killed by winter? But it's not just about fines!

I had arbitrage practice with one Internet provider. I used their Internet services for a week, and during this week I contacted technical support about 8 times and even had a technician come to fix problems with the Internet, but nothing helped. It was decided to refuse them, but this cannot be done over the phone, as in other companies! And naturally, since I am a busy person, I came to close the contract in a month. I wrote a statement, returned the equipment and heard that it turned out that I owed them 680 rubles for services, and this was despite the free 3 months as they promised me. I refused to pay, and every week their specialists called me, who told me different amounts each time. My debt is from 680 rubles. increased to 1400 rub. How? Where? As a result, they sued me, naturally the court hearing took place without me, since no one considered it necessary to notify me of this, and the bank ordered me to pay this amount, plus legal costs.

The bailiffs took this money from my card. Naturally, waving your fists after a fight was pointless.