Young profiles are a prime target for banking institutions! Indeed, most often, children keep the bank account opened for them by their parents for many years, well after they reach the age of majority.

The challenge is therefore to get these new customers as soon as possible to be able to sell them a wide range of services later. But while traditional institutions have long offered formulas dedicated to this target audience, the arrival on the market of specialized and less expensive neobanks has reshuffled the cards.

Faced with the rise of banking offers for minors, the Autorité de contrôle prudentiel et de résolution (ACPR), the sector's policeman, interviewed a sample of twelve payment services in 2022 to ensure that the products made available to them were well adapted.

And the balance sheet published in January is rather... mixed!

Delayed flow and checkbook in the crosshairs

On the panel surveyed at the end of 2021, more than 1.1 million bank accounts were held by teens aged 12 to 17. However, among them, nearly half were equipped with a bank card, an increase of 58% of cards in circulation among this clientele since 2020.

The good news is that "in 9 out of 10 cases, these are cards with systematic balance control that are the preferred means of payment".

However, other cards, including deferred debit cards, as well as cheque books have also been identified. A real financial danger denounced by the Control Authority which recalls that these means of payment "should not be issued to this clientele since they are likely to generate an unauthorized overdraft on the account of the minor".

In fact, such situations have been observed, with up to 2.5 per cent of accounts held by minors overdrafts in some of the institutions interviewed.

A risk of fraud

In addition, seemingly innocuous operations are offered without supervision while exposing teenagers to a risk of fraud. This is particularly the case for "adding a beneficiary to make a transfer, increasing the withdrawal and payment limits of a card or remitting a cheque to cashing".

And the constable of the sector to cite the "mule fraud" which consists of cashing a check for someone before returning the funds, except that the check in question is actually stolen, falsified or bounced and will be rejected.

OUR "BANK" FILE

Given the vulnerability of adolescents, the ACPR therefore encourages professionals to better adapt their offers for minors and to set up internal mechanisms to detect situations requiring enhanced surveillance.

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