In two separate incidents, foreign students have been the target of a banking scam in the city centre.
The students were told they had to purchase a ticket with their bank card from a nearby ATM to “pass a road that was closed”.
A 25-year-old Dutch student, who did not want to be named, said she was walking along Wale Street when she was approached by an unknown woman earlier last month.
“I thought this was weird, but the lady was so polite. She said the road was closed because of the rain and I needed to purchase a ticket from the nearby ATM to pass,” the student said.
A man wearing what looked like security attire approached them and accompanied her to the nearby Absa ATM, where they insisted she use her international card to withdraw money.
“They told me to type my PIN. As I was typing my PIN it displayed all the numbers on the screen. When I looked again, the lady and security were gone and so was my card,” she said.
The student blocked her card soon and no money was taken from her account.
In a similar incident a week earlier, French student Sarah Andersen was walking with a friend on the corner of Adderley and Riebeek Street when she was approached.
“I was very suspicious and we ran away,” Andersen said.
Absa head of self-service channels and branchless banking Allen Mahadeo said: “The scam you are referring to is not common to a specific bank and all the banks are targeted.
“The issue in Cape Town is being addressed with law enforcement agencies. We don’t place guards at every ATM.
"However we have a specialised team who deal with such criminal activities across the country, with special kits (cameras) at our ATMs to track, monitor and arrest such criminals.”
A recent statement by the SA Banking Risk Information Centre said credit card fraud had increased by 13% from R331.4million in 2015 to R374.4m in 2016, with debit card fraud increasing by 3.1% for the same period.