Why can't clients pay instalments by card at the bank?

Whilst encouraging clients to use cards when paying in stores instead of withdrawing cash, bankers forget to accept them at their own counters, where bills, taxes, and even credit instalments are payable only with cash.

So, customers are invited to withdraw cash from ATMs in order to make a payment to the bank, but such an operation is charged a commission. Card payments to accepting merchants are free-of-charge for clients.

Moreover, a series of banks have POS terminals at the pay offices in bank agencies, but they can be used only for cash withdrawal, acting as an alternative to ATMs when the latter are not operational. BCR, the biggest bank in the system, charges a 2% fee on cash withdrawals from POS terminals in its own agencies (a minimum of 4.5 RON), i.e. more than for using the ATM.

How is this paradox explained? "Banks cannot operate as merchants in the system, so the POS terminals installed in their agencies only allow cash withdrawals, while payments cannot be accepted," says Catalin Cretu, manager for Romania of Visa Europe, one of the leading payment organisations operating on the Romanian market.