In keeping with worldwide
experience, Australia is experiencing an increase in the incidence
of payments fraud, reports the Australian Payments Clearing
Association (APCA). The industry body’s findings are based on fraud
data for cheques, debit cards credit cards and charge cards for the
12 months to 30 June 2009.
Across all four payment instruments, APCA
reported that compared with the 2007-08 12 month period fraud
increased by almost A$0.02 ($0.018) for every A$1,000 transacted,
from A$0.0722 to A$0.0898 in every A$1,000.
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Of the individual payments means, cheques
remained the least impacted with cheque fraud remaining steady at
A$0.009 in every $1,000 transacted and an unchanged 0.4
transactions in every 100,000 transactions. The total value of
cheque transactions during the 12 months was A$1.503 trillion, down
14.8 percent from A$1.765 trillion in the previous 12 months.
Combined debit, credit and charge card fraud
increased by A$0.01 (3.1 percent) in every A$1,000 to A$0.33, a
level which APCA stressed is low by global standards. For example,
the UK’s card fraud rate is the equivalent of about A$1 in every
A$1,000 transacted, or three times higher than Australia’s payment
card fraud rate.
Credit and charge card fraud displayed the
smallest deterioration, rising 2.5 percent from A$0.515 to A$0.528
in every A$1,000 transacted.
The incidence of credit and charge card fraud
rose at a considerably higher 18.9 percent, from 20.6 transactions
to 24.5 transactions in every 100,000 transactions.
The total value of credit and charge card
transactions increased by 6.6 percent compared with the previous 12
month period to A$279.86 billion, while the total value of credit
and charge card fraud transactions, A$147.81 million, represented
82 percent of total fraudulent transactions of A$180.23
million.
The biggest increase in fraud was experienced
in the debit card sector, with losses sustained at ATMs and
electronic POS rising 15.6 percent from A$0.0739 to A$0.0854 in
every $1,000 transacted. The incidence of debit card fraud fell
slightly from 2.2 transactions to 2.1 transactions in every 100,000
transactions while the total value of debit card fraud was A$19.15
million.
The APCA attributed the increase in debit card
fraud rate primarily to the skimming attacks at ATMs and POS
devices. The total value of debit card transactions was A$224.14
billion, up 6.8 percent compared with the previous 12 month
period.
