STAFF WRITER
THE Payment Association of Namibia(PAN) has agreed to pay an out of court settlement of N$ 319,650 to the Namibia Competition Commission (NaCC) for introducing card card scheduling that fixes the interchange fees agreed between Namibian banks.
According to NaCC the decision constituted non competitive behavior.
The payment is broken down to include a pecuniary penalty of N$ 299,650.00 and an additional amount of N$ 20,000.00 for purposes of covering part of the Commission’s costs arising from its Investigation.
“ These amounts will become payable upon confirmation of the Consent Agreement as an order of the Court, in one (1) instalment, with the first and final instalment being payable within 30 (thirty) days from the date of this Consent Agreement being made an order of the Court,” a statement released by the NaCC’s Corporate Communications Practitioner Dina Gaoses said.
NaCC initiated an investigation against PAN on March 2022 after PAN and some commercial banks in the country adopted the Payment Clearing House Card Schedule (Card Schedule or PCH), which caters for the settlement and clearing rules.
However the Card Schedules, fixes the interchange fees agreed between Namibian banks.
“ This conduct had been ongoing for a number of years, at least since 2014 and until 2020, when the exemption application was granted with conditions,”Gaoses said.
PAN is a statutory body established for the management, administration, operation, regulation and supervision of payment, clearing and settlement systems in Namibia; and registered commercial banks, including , First National Bank of Namibia (FNB), Bank Windhoek Ltd (Bank Windhoek), Standard Bank Namibia Ltd (Standard Bank), and Nedbank Namibia Ltd (Nedbank).
NaCC said their investigations revealed that PAN and the relevant commercial banks, have in terms of this schedule, multilaterally agreed to interchange/settlement fees.
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