{"id":614414,"date":"2025-10-20T07:13:36","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T05:13:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=614414"},"modified":"2025-10-20T07:16:33","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T05:16:33","slug":"important-information-for-people-who-pay-with-bank-cards-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/banking\/614414-important-information-for-people-who-pay-with-bank-cards-in-south-africa.html","title":{"rendered":"Important information for people who pay with bank cards in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The South African Consumer Goods and Services Ombudsman (CGSO) says retailers and traders in the country aren’t allowed to add a surcharge for card payments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to Cape Talk<\/a>, Ombudsman Liaquat “Lee” Soobrathi said suppliers and retailers who do so are effectively penalising shoppers for choosing to pay with a debit or check card.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The simple answer to the question is no. In South Africa, you are not allowed to charge a surcharge simply because someone chooses to use a bank card as a method of payment,” he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A supplier could be an informal trader. It could be someone that you see at a market. They are not allowed to charge you a surcharge simply because you want to use a card.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soobrathi explained that suppliers who choose to offer card or tap payments do so to make it convenient for their customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“In no way can the consumer be penalised for that choice,” he stated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Referencing Section 23 of the Consumer Protection Act, Soobrathi said retailers must charge the price they advertise or have marked on the product.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I can’t get to the till and then all of a sudden stand back and wonder why I am being charged R10 extra, R5 extra,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It’s not fair within the borders of South Africa, and it’s something that we would frown upon.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It should be noted that this also applies to tap payments made with digital wallets such as Apple Wallet, Garmin Pay, Google Wallet, and SwatchPay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These apps enable cardholders to link their physical or virtual bank cards, allowing them to make in-person payments using contactless-enabled smartphones and wearables.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Payments like these are seeing an uptick in popularity in South Africa. Not only are they convenient, but digital wallets also offer additional security through biometric authentication, PINs, and passcodes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africans are saying goodbye to physical bank cards<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The recent financial results of three major South African banks indicate that residents are increasingly adopting digital wallets and virtual cards<\/a>, thereby reducing their reliance on physical card payments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Absa, Discovery Bank, FNB, Nedbank, and Standard Bank have offered digital wallet support for several years, and several of these banks have continued to see significant growth in the payment method.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FNB recorded a 45% increase in digital wallet transaction volumes in its 2025 financial year and a 68% increase in virtual card transaction values.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is impressive, considering virtual card transactions already accounted for 11.5% of all card spend at FNB in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nedbank also saw strong digital contactless payment growth, with volumes increasing by 61% in the first half of its 2025 financial year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Discovery Bank has also recently stated that over 60% of its customers prefer to pay with digital wallets instead of physical cards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Capitec, South Africa’s largest bank by customers, introduced digital wallet support in 2022, several years after some of its competitors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It recorded rapid uptake in its 2025 financial year, with digital wallet transactions increasing by 159%, reaching 167 million transactions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The spend by clients using Apple Pay, Garmin Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Pay increased by more than 2.5 times to R43.2 billion (2024: R13.1 billion), while volumes increased to 167.2 million transactions (2024: 64.5 million),” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A total of one million clients make use of these products (2024: 0.5 million).”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The trends observed with major banks correlate with the findings of Stitch’s 2025 State of Consumer Payments in South Africa report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The survey, conducted among 2,000 South Africans, found that 90% had tried or used payment methods other than cash or cards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The table below summarises the increase in digital wallet and virtual card spending among major banks that recently published financial results with details about digital wallet and virtual card uptake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bank<\/th>Period<\/th>Digital wallet<\/th>Virtual card<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Capitec<\/strong><\/td>FY 2025<\/td>+159% in volumes
+161% in values<\/td>		Not available<\/td><\/tr>
FNB<\/strong><\/td>FY 2025<\/td>+45% in volumes<\/td>+68% in value<\/td><\/tr>
Nedbank<\/strong><\/td>H1 2025<\/td>+61% in volumes<\/td>Not available<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Consumer Goods and Services Ombudsman has warned that South African shoppers mustn’t be penalised for choosing to pay with a bank card.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341076,"featured_media":556169,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10106],"tags":[2186,26730,47306,5334,74894,38880,1313,69307,43280,96567,1111,101843,44682,36476,1851,80697],"class_list":["post-614414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-banking","tag-absa","tag-apple-pay","tag-bank-cards","tag-capitec","tag-digital-wallets","tag-discovery-bank","tag-fnb","tag-garmin-pay","tag-google-pay","tag-lee-soobrathi","tag-nedbank","tag-physical-cards","tag-samsung-pay","tag-south-african-consumer-goods-and-services-ombudsman-cgso","tag-standard-bank","tag-virtual-cards"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614414"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341076"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=614414"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":614526,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614414\/revisions\/614526"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=614414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=614414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=614414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}