A client withdraw money at Vietcombank ATMs in Ha Noi. — VNA/VNS Photo Tran Viet

HA NOI (Biz Hub)— Anyone who makes a money transfer via Vietcombank's local debit card now has to pay a VND5,000 (23 US cent) fee per transaction, an increase of 67 per cent against last month.

This is the second stage of fees from Vietcombank that is making the trip to the ATM so costly.

The fee excludes a value-added tax of 10 per cent on each transaction using a debit card, an electronic card issued by a bank which allows bank clients access to their account to withdraw cash or pay for goods and services.

"For one transfer, it is not really a matter. But when added together, Vietcombank has a million card holders, each of them do at least one transfer per month, Vietcombank will get billions of dong," said Viet Thang, a Vietcombank debit card holder in Ha Noi.

"They should improve service quality along with the surcharge."

Another Vietcombank's customer, Vu Quang Dong, added that: "An ATM card is my access to my monthly salary. I have to either withdraw cash or transfer money to do business. Then, there is no way to avoid these kinds of fees at all."

The new policy came after Vietcombank six months ago applied surcharges of VND1,000 for internal withdrawals and VND3,000 for external withdrawals, the highest fees allowed by the State Bank of Viet Nam.

Vietcombank kept saying that providing good maintenance and administration for their ATM system was expensive.

Consequently fees are generally going up and up, as banks look to offset the higher costs of operating the machines and declining ATM fee revenue in the wake of regulations restricting certain fees.

According to the State Bank of Viet Nam statistics, there are about 50 million ATM cards and 15,000 ATMs installed. Vietcombank is one of the six major shareholders - namely Agribank, Vietinbank, Vietcombank, DongA, BIDV and Techcombank - owning 8,200 ATMs.

These big players are on the way to getting fees increased. — VNS