Is it true that the country's largest bank is not subject to any laws?
January 14th was a dark day for many PrivatBank clients. They were shocked to suddenly discover they owed the bank, a longtime partner, large sums of money. Moreover, the bank, completely convinced it was right, simply wrote off the "debts" calculated through a mysterious scheme from its clients' card accounts. Some were missing a few hundred hryvnias, while others lost over 10-20.
Late in the evening, a scandal erupted on the personal Facebook page of PrivatBank Deputy Chairman Oleg Gorokhovsky. Outraged clients began complaining about the bank's actions, which had debited large sums from their accounts, citing the need to "adjust amounts for foreign currency transactions for the period from September 1, 2014, to January 10, 2015 (cd 6511962)":
As it turned out during the investigation, PrivatBank had made these withdrawals from cards used to top up foreign bank cards (so-called "P2P transactions"). Here are the standard responses that outraged customers received when they contacted the bank's online support:
It has been established that during the period from 09/01/14 to 01/10/15, a money transfer was made in national currency from payment card 557721 issued in your name to a card account in foreign currency. According to the Bank's regulations, such transactions are conducted at the commercial exchange rate, which is indicated on the official website of PJSC CB "PRIVATBANK" on the Internet www.privatbank.ua. However, due to a technological failure in the system that occurred during the transactions, the commercial rate was reflected incorrectly and the transaction was actually conducted at a significantly lower rate. In accordance with clause 1.1.2.1.11. of the Terms and Conditions, in the event of a debt of the cardholder / account as a result of exchange rate differences, technical errors in the operation of the equipment and in other cases, the Client undertakes to repay the debt within 30 days from the date it arose. Thus, the outstanding balance in the amount of xx xxx is the actual recalculation of the amounts of your transactions at the adjusted exchange rate. In order to pay off the outstanding balance and taking into account the provisions of Part 2 of Article 1071 of the Civil Code of Ukraine, Section 6 of the "Instructions on Non-cash Settlements in National Currency" approved by Resolution No. 22 of the Board of the National Bank of Ukraine dated January 21, 2004, and the provisions of Section 2.1.1.3.5 of the Terms and Rules for the Provision of Banking Services, the Bank has written off the outstanding balance from your accounts as agreed. We draw your attention to the need to properly fulfill your obligations and pay the remaining balance.
A couple of months ago, PrivatBank became famous for being the first commercial bank to establish two exchange rates: one "for branches"—a rate at which currency was bought from trusting clients; and a second "for cards and deposits"—a rate several hryvnias higher than the first, at which currency was sold for deposits and currency payments were debited from hryvnia cards. However, it seems that even this wasn't enough for PrivatBank, and it decided to retroactively improve its financial situation.
The response of the first deputy chairman of PrivatBank to outraged clients is also very revealing:
Of course, the bank won't hear any insults. But when clients recover from the shock, they'll vote with their feet. Who wants to deal with a bank that can confiscate all your money at any moment for a trumped-up reason? A bank to which you can't prove anything?
It's unlikely that the largest bank will benefit from this...
While clients are actively discussing how to get their money back: We're discussing Privat, and we're waiting for the rest of the story—read it soon on the Kurs Deneg website.
Egor Zelinsky
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