2. Why do you believe that an instant payment system requires us to "give out our bank details to every stranger we meet at the market" when numerous countries have already implemented such systems that don't require that?
At least in the case of Germany, this is factually incorrect: We do have Lastschrift, which is eerily similar to "drawing money from an account". Sure, we can get that money back during a six week period IF the receiver still has it, but it is a hassle.
What? I thought the main problem was how easy it is to do identity theft in the US. You mean I can steal someone's money with just their account number ?!?
2. I was replying to a message, and in that message the user gave the example that at a farmers market someone could pay using a bank transfer. If I'm a farmer at that market I'm going to have to give my bank account details to all the strangers who want to buy a few apples from me, so they can instantly transfer money to my account.
You shouldn't give out usernames and passwords. Your bank account number is not a secret.
> I'm going to have to give my bank account details to all the strangers who want to buy a few apples from me
I don't know what it's like in Ireland, but literally every business in Austria prints their bank account number on the invoice so you can pay it. Bank account numbers are not secret. There's not much people can do with a bank account number apart from send money to it.
It's pretty much the same in Ireland, I've no idea what the other commenter thinks can be accomplished with an IBAN.
Seen as you are also Irish you will appreciate this example: https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/consumer/common_consum...
Under the header 'Protect your money', the first bullet point is never use bank tranfers.
The first bullet point is
"Never send money by bank transfer unless you are absolutely certain you are sending it to someone you know and trust. Sending money by bank transfer is like sending someone cash and generally, once you send it, it’s gone"
which is about paying by bank transfers, and very different from "never hand out your bank account to receive payments", which pretty much every business (that do not want the keep their proceeds off the record) does by default in many (most?) European countries.
Sure, if some stranger on the street asked for my bank account (or my name for that matter) out of the blue, I wouldn't do so. But for Craigslist type in-person sales, people here have no problem giving their bank account to receive payments. The typical fraud is here is asking for payments of to be delivered goods and subsequently not sending the promised goods, which is what I understand your link is also warning about. Because European bank payments are mostly push-type, that are largely irreversible. For direct in-person sales (such as farmers on a market), that's not an issue.
Someone could transfer money to you and write "thanks for the plutonium" into the reference field.
2. I still don't know why you think it's a problem for a farmer at a market to share their bank account number for people to pay them. Pretty much any business bank account number here is public information. But even if for some reason you think that it's hugely problematic, it's technically pretty simple to setup an instant payment system that don't require making any account number public.
The GENERAL (I will super emphasize this word this time - G.E.N.E.R.A.L) advice from financial institutions for a very long time has been that scammers want your personal information, so to stay safe you should not give bank info to strangers. They also reccommend avoiding bank transfers, money grams and other such things and only using secure card payments.
Again, this is GENERAL advice, if someone wants someone else to send them money they can of course give them their account number and get the money transfered, I never said there was anything wrong with bank transfers, just that the GENERAL advice is to avoid them, they are often associated with scammers.
There was a prank call show on tv about 10 years ago called fonejacker (UK tv) and one of the characters used to ring people up and ask for their bank account details (example sketch here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LA3zhzT1wDo ) and funnily enough, no one that I recall ever gave them out.
If 2 people want to make a transaction via bank transfer they can, but the GENERAL advice has always been to avoid them and don't be handing out bank details to strangers. Obviously, "dont give bank details to strangers" is not an exact quote from a financial institution, it is just the GENERAL theme of the overall advice to avoid being scammed.
You'll find as well that most of your banking apps allow you to save the IBAN of various contacts. I have the IBANs of a few friends and family members saved to my phone that way, and the only thing I can do with that information is send them money.