Transparent Card Payments

Since the implementation of real-name corporate treatments to their buyers, card payments of more than 500,000 won have decreased while those of less than that amount have greatly increased.

According to BC Card on February 17, card payments at golf clubs from January until February 8 of this year experienced a decrease in the number of payments of more than 500,000 won while experiencing a 25 percent increase in the number of payments of less than that amount. Room salons (Korean bars with female attendants) and other entertainment bars also experienced a great decrease, but the smaller payments did not differ much in quantity.

The real-name corporate treatment system, which was implemented this year, states that personal details of people who make payments of more than 500,000 won per case will be recorded. During the examination period, the number of payments of more than 500,000 won amounted to 10,357 cases (8.1 billion won), decreasing by 9.4 percent from the same period last year when 11,429 cases (8.5 billion won) were reported. The decrease is 4.7 percent of the amount of money. The number of payments of less than the amount came to 180,085 cases (app. 23.4 billion won), increasing by 25.5 percent over last year’s 143,478 cases (app. 18.6 billion won).

The number of payments of more than 500,000 won at entertainment bars greatly decreased from last year’s 116,502 cases (112.2 billion won) to 71,424 cases (67.6 billion won) this year, while those of less than the amount decreased by a small number from last year’s 1,251,235 cases (100.6 billion won) to 1,155,689 cases (88.4 billion won).

“Corporations are cutting down on the scale of corporate-level treatment of their buyers, and there has been a corresponding increase in the number of small-amount payments. However, there is the possibility that this was induced by expedient methods,” said an official in the card industry.

Chang-Won Kim changkim@donga.com