Receiving salary via ATM presents major problems

Although most businesses countrywidehave been paying their workers via ATM for the last three years, the system’s infrastructure has yet to adequately develop, making wage-withdrawing troublesome for workers.
Duong Nam Hung, a worker in the Tan Thuan processing and exporting zone, said he has had to receive salary via ATM since he first starting working there two years ago.

“But nine out of the ten times I go to the ATM booths, I have to wait in a long queue for my turn to withdraw,” he said.

“Last month, I had to queue from 6pm to 8:30pm in order to get a mere 3 million dong.”

Nguyen Thi Ha, who works for Duy Hung Co in the Binh Duong-based Song Than Industrial Park, said she often goes to withdraw her wages as early as 6am to avoid a long wait.

But, even that early in the morning, Ha sometimes has to wait an hour to receive her money, she said.

She added that she always fears that the machine will go broken, something that has occurred many times before.

“The ATM simply returned my card without any banknotes when I went to withdraw my salary last month,” she said.

“At least the bank told me that the transaction could not be processed since the machine had experienced a breakdown.”

Workers in the Song Than Industrial Park said there are only three Techombank ATM booths in the park to serve around 6,000 workers.

They said the machines usually break down at various points during a given month, and they often suspend services at the time of wage paying.

T.H, a worker at Hansoll Vina Co, which is also located in the park, said workers in her company receive salary via ATMs on the 30th day of every month.

Oftentimes, some workers have to wait nearly a week to be able to withdraw their money, since there are so many of them that need to use the three machines, she said.

But, she added, “last week the bank informed us that the three machines would be out of commission from December 31 to January 2, 2012, so that the bank can finalize their year-end balance sheet.”

“With the machines set to be suspended, I do not know when I can get my money this time,” she said, adding that she has no idea why the whole ATM system has to be halted for the bank to calculate their financial report.

“This is unreasonable, since no nearby banks suspend their ATMs for this reason.”

Problematic ATM system

Many workers at the Song Than Industrial Parks said Techcombank’s ATMs have stopped working almost every month when came time for workers to withdraw their wages.

On the other days of the month, only one or two machines were operational, while on the rest of the days they often produced errors or ran out of money, they said.

K, a worker from northern Thai Binh province, said the bank has given many excuses for the ATMs problems during the salary-paying times.

“There was even a ridiculous reason ‘like the ATM booths have been struck by lighting’,” he said, adding that the machines had to cease operation for five weeks after that accident.

Workers also complained that there were cases when workers could not get the full wages their companies had paid.

Sau, a worker at Hansoll Vina, for instance, said she had receive only 1.8 million dong in wages last month, while the company had informed her that the figure would be around 3.78 million dong.

The company assured her that they had transferred the adequate amount of salary, and asked her to complain to the bank.

For its part, the bank asked her to wait up to a month while it looked into the issue.

“This means that I have to wait until the salary payment at the end of December to receive the wages of last month,” she lamented.

Tuoi Tre

Tags: Vietnam banking industry, Vietnam finance, Vietnam financial