According to Hoy newspaper, the ProConsumidor agency is questioning three important areas of customer conflicts with the nation’s banks. The report says that the first issue came about when the banks were reticent to provide ProConsumidor (National Institute for Consumer Rights) with their form contracts that clients have to sign for credit cards or other services.
ProConsumidor requested the contracts to check whether there were any clauses or sections that were illegal, improper or abusive to the consumers. According to the consumer protection agency, the measure sought to make the relation between banks and customers more transparent.
The second problem area is that the banks seem to be charging additional fees for the new standardized checks that were recently required above and beyond what the printers are charging. In an attempt to justify this additional charge, the banks have authorized only certain printers to produce the new checks. One customer complained: “Just for ordering the new checks the banks are charging… which makes no sense at all since the banks are not intermediaries for printing houses”.
The third issue with the banks is the fact that when the Central Bank increased interest rates, the increase was applied at once to all outstanding loans, but not to savings and other deposits.