Whilst encouraging clients to use cards when paying in storesinstead of withdrawing cash, bankers forget to accept them at theirown counters, where bills, taxes, and even credit instalments arepayable only with cash.
So, customers are invited to withdraw cash from ATMs in order tomake a payment to the bank, but such an operation is charged acommission. Card payments to accepting merchants are free-of-chargefor clients.
Moreover, a series of banks have POS terminals at the payoffices in bank agencies, but they can be used only for cashwithdrawal, acting as an alternative to ATMs when the latter arenot operational. BCR, the biggest bank in the system, charges a 2%fee on cash withdrawals from POS terminals in its own agencies (aminimum of 4.5 RON), i.e. more than for using the ATM.
How is this paradox explained? "Banks cannot operate asmerchants in the system, so the POS terminals installed in theiragencies only allow cash withdrawals, while payments cannot beaccepted," says Catalin Cretu, manager for Romania of Visa Europe,one of the leading payment organisations operating on the Romanianmarket.
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