Check will change from October 2nd; understand – 05/08/2023 – Market

The check may change from October 2nd to increase security and combat fraud. The BC (Central Bank) informed last Friday (5) that it approved changes in the regulations to make this means of payment “more modern and safer”.

The main change is that the agency will no longer establish a standard for the check model. This role will be assigned to financial institutions, through market self-regulation, and no longer to the Central Bank.

The BC believes that there will be no drastic changes at first. “Significant changes would imply high adaptation costs by the banks themselves”, explained Antonio Guimarães, consultant for Denor (Standards Department) of the Central Bank. Until October 2, the current rules remain in effect.

The agency informed that two changes may come into force from October 2: the inclusion of a security code and the permission for the user to add his social name on the check sheets.

The first measure would have the objective of increasing security and preventing fraud, placing the security code in the place where the branch data of the client’s account is. “This space can start to store a security code to guarantee that the check is legitimate, for example”, pointed out Guimarães.

The inclusion of the social name would repeat what is done in Pix. The customer who wants the change could go to the bank to find out how to proceed. However, the two changes will depend on each financial institution.

The BC stated that other changes will have to be notified by the financial institutions to the BC 30 days in advance of their implementation. “The new standard for checks will help combat fraud attempts by criminals who use false checks to harm citizens”, said the Denor consultant.

In addition to abandoning the regulation of checks, the BC announced that it will no longer be a permanent member of the consultative group of Compe (Centralização de Compensação de Cheques), the system responsible for clearing checks between banks. The body will become an observer.

The advisory group has the role of expressing opinions on issues related to the compensation system and developing and submitting studies to improve the system. According to BC, this change does not threaten the continuity of the group and enables greater efficiency.

Check drop in recent years

Since the launch of Pix in November 2020, the check has been losing ground among means of payment in Brazil. In October of that year, 21.9 million checks were used for payments or transfers. This number reached its lowest point in February 2023, with 12.4 million. In March, there were 13.7 million check payments, according to BC data.

In terms of cash, the check moved BRL 53.4 billion in October 2020. The volume fell to less than BRL 50 billion per month between October 2022 and January 2023, but rose in the last two months and reached R$56 billion in March of this year.

According to BC, the total moved with checks in 2021 was BRL 667 billion, while the following year the sum was reduced to BRL 666 billion.

Changes also in DOC and Tech

Other means of payment that will undergo changes will be the DOC (Credit Order Document) and the Tech (Special Credit Transfer), which will cease to exist on February 29, 2024. The measure was announced last week by Febraban (Brazilian Federation of Banks).

The DOC is used by individuals and legal entities, and its operation transfers the amount one day after the bank receives the order. According to the federation, it was used in 59 million transactions in 2022, with a total of 63.07 billion bank transactions.

Pix was the most used modality in the period, with 24 billion operations, followed by credit card (18.2 billion), debit card (15.6 billion), boleto (4 billion), TED (1.01 billion ) and checks (202.8 million).

The Tech, on the other hand, is used exclusively by companies to pay benefits to employees, and the transfer of resources occurs until the end of the same day that the order was given.

The two operations that will cease to exist have a transaction limit of R$ 4,999.99.

In the case of the DOC, the banks will offer to issue and schedule the DOC until January 15, 2024, at 10 pm. DOCs performed up to that date can be scheduled no later than February 29, 2024. Febraban reported that each bank will be responsible for defining its strategy for communicating with customers and establishing dates for the end of DOC and Tech operations.

The deadline was established for non-issuing banks to keep their receiving systems active to process DOCs and TECs.