Pix celebrates one year with new refund measure in case of fraud

Pix, an instant payment system, completes one year this Tuesday (16) and now has new security measures. The special return mechanism starts to apply today, which allows the bank to revert amounts to the payer’s account in cases of fraud or operational failure.

The return of funds can be requested either by the institution of the recipient or by the payer.

Since the launch of Pix, users can return amounts received through the system, in whole or in part. There was, however, no provision for the return to be initiated by the recipient’s relationship institution.

According to the autarchy, the objective is to accelerate the reversal process when there is fraud and/or failure. The transaction will appear in the statement of transactions.

The functionality was authorized in June, before the security measures announced by the Central Bank in August, such as the limit of R$1,000 between 8:00 pm and 6:00 am, which began to apply on October 4th.

In addition to the possibility of returning funds, the possibility for the bank to retain a suspicious operation on Pix for up to 72 hours for analysis and the mandatory notification of infringement, which was previously optional, also come into force on Tuesday.

The notification works as a marking on the Pix key made by the bank, on the user’s CPF or CNPJ and on the account number, when fraud is found. This information will be shared with other institutions whenever there is a consultation. With this, the BC hopes that the so-called orange accounts, which are rented or lent, can be identified.

The two measures were announced in August, along with the night cap restriction.

After the launch of the new payment method in November of last year, crooks have taken advantage of Pix’s ease and speed to apply scams or to ask the victim to transfer large amounts quickly during robberies or kidnappings.

Criminals often use orange accounts to receive the money, in addition to spreading it to others, which makes it difficult for the police to track down the amounts and dismantle the gangs.

To increase security in operations with Pix, BC announced a series of changes in the payment system rules.

MAIN PIX CHANGES

How was it

• Limits: same as TED at any time
• Suspicious transactions: the bank could not retain any transaction and settlement had to be done on time
• Limit increase request: each bank had a policy
• Account registration: not allowed

how is it

• Limits: standard of R$1,000 between 8:00 pm and 6:00 am, which can be modified by the client; measure also applies to TED and transfer on WhatsApp
• Suspicious trades: the bank can hold a suspicious trade in Pix for 30 minutes during the day or 60 minutes at night for risk analysis
• Limit increase request: the bank must fulfill the request between 24 hours and 48 hours after the request
• Account registration: the client can register accounts previously on Pix to make transactions above the established limit, but keeping the value for other operations; registration on digital channel must be done 24 hours before