The increase in the number of frauds with bank guarantees has been observed in Russia recently, this is due, among other things, to their demand, said on December 26, Candidate of Legal Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Civil Law Disciplines of the PRUE. G.V. Plekhanova Natalia Svechnikova.
“For example, there are a large number of fraudsters who declare themselves to be intermediaries representing the interests of banks; there are cases when the guarantee is already provided in violation of the requirements of the law, “RIA Novosti quotes her.
According to the expert, the guarantee can be issued for a larger amount than required by the Central Bank standard. In some cases, guarantees may not be entered in the relevant register, which may also indicate fraud.
In addition, banks, not having a Central Bank license for the relevant type of activity, can nevertheless offer the services of issuing a bank guarantee.
The introduction of electronic banking guarantees will reduce the number of frauds in this area, the assistant professor added.
The same opinion was expressed by the lawyer, head of the criminal practice of BMS Law Firm, Alexander Inoyadov. He noted that the trend for the development of digital platforms for banking services will positively affect the transparency, availability and reliability of such services, since the guarantees provided in paper form require additional verification or carry risks of their inauthenticity.
“Banks are switching to electronic bank guarantees (EBG), which are issued in the form of a special file reinforced with an electronic digital signature (EDS) of the guarantor bank,” stressed Andrei Bondar, Deputy Chairman of the Board – Director of the Credit Department of the Federal Banking Union (FBS).
In this case, there is no need to talk about fraud, since the procedure is high-tech and excludes any attempts at fraud, the expert said, adding that bank guarantees issued in accordance with 223-FZ (“On the procurement of goods, works, services by certain types of legal entities”) , are not reflected in the register, but are verified by the customer through a written request to the bank or a message in the SWIFT system, which also excludes fraud, but still leaves some hole in the system.
Earlier, in November, the Central Bank announced the emergence of a new scheme of fraud with bank clients, in which fraudsters, on behalf of bank managers, persuade the client to come to the branch, and halfway send instructions in the messenger from a branded account how to transfer money to a pseudo-secure account.