According to the banks, clients most often use the recipient message to describe the reason for their payment. It is easier to find them.
“Typically for a good or service, for example a summer camp, a language course. Or they state the name as an addition to the variable symbol,” describes Česká spořitelna spokesperson Lukáš Kropík.
This is a feature that has been introduced as part of mobile or internet banking. What the report can and cannot contain is determined by the rules of the Certis payment system of the Czech National Bank.
So it can have a maximum of 140 characters including spaces, any alphanumeric characters with Czech and Slovak diacritics, basic characters such as dashes, dots or brackets can be used. On the contrary, it is not possible to use, for example, the euro or dollar sign, as well as forward slashes, quotation marks and other special characters.
According to Kropík, this function is used by 15 percent of clients at the savings bank. But it is even more in other banks. For example, at Raiffeisenbank, a report for the recipient is completed for approximately 40 percent of payments. The same number was also given by Komerční banka or Air Bank.
At the same time, the Czechs, with their famous sense of humor, do not stop at just a simple description of payments.
“Clients use the messages, in addition to general descriptions of payments, various jokes or, for example, love confessions often appear. And we can also mention some transparent account where the messages are public. Real pearls can be found in political movements during pre-election campaigns,” says Michal Kuzmiak, spokesperson for Air Bank.
“If you want a monkey, you have to have bananas. Ask someone out for it. I kiss you my love. From the sexiest husband,” Komerční banka spokeswoman Šárka Nevoralová lists some of the messages. He adds that people can include a note graphically in the message for the recipient:
- (.)(.)
- (-_(-_(-_-)_-)_-)
According to spokesman Jakub Heřmánek, Fio Bank does not monitor the frequency of use of messages for recipients, but clients use them a lot.
“In addition to the purpose of the payment, people also write various messages. But some would certainly not even be publishable, some are more laughable. Because of, for example, obscene words in the message to the recipient, we do not take any special steps,” says Heřmánek.
But the authorities also use the message for recipients. At the beginning of the year, it was, for example, the Czech Social Security Administration, which sent pensioners information about the January valuation in a report. It thus saved 45 million crowns in costs for material, printing and postage for approximately 1.7 million letters.
Consider what you write, the banks advise
However, nothing can be written in messages for recipients. When entering an outgoing payment, banks check whether they contain unauthorized characters. And this obligation is also imposed on them by anti-money laundering (AML) measures.
Banks don’t deal with messages like “We got it going decently”, “Here it is back, Lakota”, “Don’t take it for nonsense”. However, insults, references to a crime or mentions of terrorism can have an unpleasant side effect.
“The bank must proceed in accordance with the measures designed to combat money laundering, so in case of suspicion, for example, it must notify the relevant state authorities. In general, we would advise clients to consider what they include in the report, because what may appear to be a funny idea may cause problems for some third parties in the future,” advises Lucie Brunclíková, spokeswoman for Banka Creditas.
They also confirm it https://twitter.com/PavelNovotnak/status/1775219663242235953?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1775219663242235953%7Ctwgr%5Ef697df16b4d5e545380ed9bb57a495f730c64345%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.penize.cz%2Fprime-bankovnictvi%2F455156-tady-to-mas-zpatky-lakoto-zpravy-pro-prijemce-jsou-v-kurzu on the social network X, where people confided in each other what messages they were sending through the bank. “I write, for example, ‘For drugs and whores.’ And a friend thanked me when I sent it to the company’s audited account,” confides one of the participants in the discussion.
Another writer wrote about it: “One client, while paying a fine, wrote in the text in the grip of emotions: ‘Eat yourself with some shit…” and within a week the criminal police was ringing for him for insults. Well, maybe it was even more peppery,” he recalls.
And another user adds: “‘The financing of world terrorism’ did not meet the understanding of one of the savings banks, and a friend had to go and explain it.”
Kateřina Hovorková
At Peníze.cz, he focuses mainly on personal finance and the labor market. He has been working in the media since the 1990s. She started at the Czech Press Agency, later went through the editorial offices of MF Dnes, iDnes, worked in Hospodářské noviny and on the website Aktuálně.cz…. Other articles by the author.
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