Did you know that the UK has the highest bank card fraud rate in Europe? There were 134 card frauds per 1,000 people in the UK in 2019, according to analysis of European Central Bank data figures carried out by the Social Market Foundation (SMF). The cost of card fraud per 1,000 people in the UK was over £8,800, and over 80% was committed by fraudsters using stolen card details.

To better protect those using CEMEX T&E cards, NatWest has updated their security procedures.
After the success that Retail Banking have experienced with using a 2-way SMS solution they are now rolling this service out to commercial cards, which will support point of sale transactions.

Moving forward, if a block is placed on the card due to suspected fraudulent transactions, the cardholder will be a sent a SMS/text to the mobile number NatWest have on record and they reply via SMS/text with a single digit i.e., 1 or a 9, to confirm if the transaction listed within the SMS is genuine, thus removing the block immediately or to confirm if it is unrecognised/not genuine.

If the transaction is unrecognised this means the block will remain on the account and the cardholder is provided with the direct telephone number for Fraud Operations to contact and resolve the matter asap.

This is a simple process which will add another layer of security for those using T&E cards and help to protect the business from fraud.