Dubai ePayment attracts 'verification' charge

A new verification process has been introduced on Dubai Government’s ePay system that charges credit card users with an additional, refundable fee when paying their utility bills or using other online payment services.

Several residents have noticed a new ‘verification charge’, a minimal amount, which is now being charged to their accounts when paying their bills across online platforms that includes Dewa, Etisalat and the Dubai Economic Department.

The new fee, however, is a refundable charge that has been introduced by the Dubai Smart Government portal as an added security measure to curb credit card fraud.

While some residents claimed their banks were not clued into this ‘reversible charge’ when enquired, a call to the ePay system’s Ask Dubai helpline confirmed the same, with the executive saying the additional fee was introduced as early as last week and has already been implemented on payment gateways for Dewa, Etisalat, DED and a few other government entities.

The fee will be introduced across all government ePay platforms by next month, added the customer service representative.

Meanwhile, the fee itself is a minimum amount chosen at random, not more than a few dirhams, which is deducted and sent via SMS alert to the registered mobile number of the credit card user.

Once the message is received, the specific amount needs to be typed into the system for the online payment to go through, as part of the new verification process.

Those users who do not receive a verification SMS from their credit card issuing bank need to contact its helpline to enquire about the recent transaction amount.

Ask aDubai has stated the charged amount is automatically reversed to the account holder within 24 hours.

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