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Commercial banks in Vietnam reportedly have started charging customers of other banks for using ATMs, the latest development in a months-long controversy over whether consumers should pay to access cash machines. Bank customers in Ho Chi Minh City recently have complained to the press about banks charging 3,300 Vietnamese dong (19 U.S. cents or 15 euro cents) for ATM transactions. The consumers reportedly had to use other banks' ATMs after machines deployed by their own financial institutions broke down. The report quotes Vietnamese banking officials as saying they have imposed the ATMs fees after receiving permission from the country's financial authorities. Those officials said the fees will help them recoup ATM investments. Local branches of foreign banks already had imposed fees for customers using ATMs deployed by other financial institutions. HSBC Vietnam, for instance, charged 1% of the transaction amount for cash withdraws made by customers of other banks, an HSBC spokesperson tells CardLine Global. "The fee is collected from the customer's account by the customer's bank instead of HSBC deducting it directly from the withdrawal amount," the spokesperson adds. Officials from domestically owned banks did not respond to CardLine Global requests for comment. Last year, the Vietnam Bank Card Association lobbied the State Bank of Vietnam for permission to impose ATM fees (CardLine Global, 24 Nov. 2008). The association had proposed the fees in July but backed down after the country's financial authorities worried about increasing fees during an economic slowdown.
