It appears better, different, in trying to make BSB+account transfers match an account name. Note the article states they cannot do that authoritatively but can compare multiple transfers to the same destination account for similarity. It is a step up from nothing although still flawed.
So itās attempting to fill the gap where the payee is not registered through PayID?
PayID is not without its limitations. In comparison it requires the consumer to make a personal commitment.
The Australian Banking Association said today that more than 12.7 million Australians had adopted PayIDĀ® as they take preventative action to protect themselves against fraud and scams.
ā¦ā¦
āItās great to see both the number of PayIDs, and the ratio of payments paid to a PayID (when compared to paying via Account Number and BSB) continuing to increase. Banks are promoting PayID, itās just a matter of continuing to push out the message itās a safer way to transfer funds,ā Ms Bligh said.
āOne of the most important steps customers can take to prevent scams today is to use PayID.ā
No comment on the allure or otherwise of the linked ABA marketing release, 06Nov22.
The CommBank initiative is definitely outside of the ABA box.
Easy solution.
Give Telstra the flick.
Telstra relies on its customers feeling āsafe and secureā with āAustraliaās best networkā and instilling a fear of losing out if they go to another network.
Grab the bull by the horns, stare down your fear and migrate to another network. You will lose nothing.
I walked into the local Telstra shop and asked the manager ācan Telstra offer me a competitive mobile phone planā? (Iām an ex-telstra customer).
His answer: āwe donāt offer competitive plans. Weāve got the best network, and everybody knows it, so we can charge whatever we likeā!
Thatās the Telstra attitude.
And yes they should be called out for this sort of cold calling behaviour.
BB
I have been using their app for some time, and it worked perfectly, including entering SMS codes to authenticate myself.
Then I believe there was an update of the app and the validation stopped working. I was trying to set up some new accounts and the CBA staff wanted to confirm my ID so they sent a code which I had to enter into the app. No code appeared. After multiple attempts we gave up and did the verbal authenication that you @Melmot have outlined.
This failure where the code would not appear continued to happen on a number of different occassions after that, so I rang the CBA help line. Eventually, I was put through to the IT Help Desk.
After multiple attempts at sending me the code, having me reboot, try different devices etc., the helpful person said there was nothing more they could do because it was a know bug with the app! Well you could have knocked me down with a pickled kipper!
Going back over all the time wasted on failed attempts to use the app for ID validation with many different areas of the bank in my head; I asked if this information was passed through the bankās knowledge base, ie did other areas of the bank know about this? Answer: yes it is passed on, and yes other areas know about this.
My next question: So why was it that no-one in the different areas of the bank I dealt with could tell me that there was a bug instead of claiming there was a problem at my end or I was doing it wrong. Answer: āno ideaā.
Question: when is the bug going to be rectified? Answer: āno ideaā.
So, yes they have the sophisticated technology to validate your ID, but they broke it with a software update. So do they have the brain power? Possibly not, because clearly the CBAās internal IT develepment procedures have failed because someone didnāt do their job properly. And worse, months later they still havenāt advised that an important part of their app is fixed.
There are various ways that payments can be fraudulently obtained. Some are more involved but most rely on some firm of ID spoofing and impersonation.
The banking industry has been focused on looking to consumer awareness as the front line. Hence any loss, even if it is not by your own hand is often not recovered.
The policy officer at the Consumer Action Law Centre, Tom Abourizk, said the government could easily mandate that all four banks adopt technology that checks the name and account are right before transferring the money.
The Commonwealth Bank recently announced NameCheck technology.
The Guardian - whose resources extend well beyond Australia also reported.
In 2019 six of the UKās biggest banks adopted a similar technology, called Confirmation of Payee, which led to a 35% fall in the amount of money lost because of misdirected payments.
How much more effective would the actions of informed consumers be with greater initiative from our banks?
Against that you have to ask the question: how many payments (in the UK) were late or even never made because the first or subsequent time that they were made, the payment failed because the check of the name failed? What was the cost of that?
Checking the name is patching up an obsolete and error prone payment mechanism (BSB and account number), rather than moving to a less error prone already available replacement.
The government should set a mandatory timetable for the phasing out of the use of BSB and account number.