Jeong Eun-bo, Financial Supervisory Service Chief, Holds Emergency Meeting on MergePlus Situation... "Reassessing Prepaid Service Providers"

Reinspection of Compliance with User Protection Guidelines for 65 Prepaid Service Providers

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Sun-mi] Financial authorities are suddenly re-examining the compliance status of user protection guidelines for prepaid service providers to prevent a recurrence of the 'Merge Point Incident,' which caused damage to consumers and merchants due to the abrupt reduction of payment services.

On the 16th, the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) announced that at 3 p.m. on the same day, Governor Jeong Eun-bo held a countermeasure meeting to review the situation of Merge Plus, along with the Senior Deputy Governor, and deputy governors in charge of strategic supervision, small and microfinance, and consumer protection.

At the meeting, measures to minimize the inconvenience experienced by Merge Plus customers and market confusion were discussed. Although the issue arose from a company not registered as a supervised entity, the FSS decided to closely monitor refund and business trends and cooperate closely with related agencies to minimize customer damage.

Furthermore, taking this incident as an opportunity, they will identify and inspect cases operating in the prepaid business sector and make efforts to prevent recurrence. They will also re-examine the compliance status of user fund protection guidelines for 65 registered prepaid service providers. An investigation will be conducted to determine whether there are cases of non-registration under the Electronic Financial Transactions Act.

Merge Point was a payment service promoting an "unlimited 20% discount." According to the industry, until recently, the number of Merge Point users was 1 million, with transactions amounting to 30 to 40 billion KRW monthly. However, on the night of the 11th, Merge Plus suddenly announced that it accepted the authorities' guidance that it could be considered a prepaid electronic payment method under the Electronic Financial Transactions Act, and stopped selling points (Merge Money) and reduced usage locations. This caused confusion, with hundreds of users visiting the headquarters demanding refunds.

An FSS official stated, "Governor Jeong emphasized the urgency of improving the system to provide stronger protection for prepaid service users and intends to use this as an opportunity to enhance public trust in digital finance."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.