Publishing the Guidelines on Merchants’ Processing of Identification Documents of Payment Cardholders

To fulfil the obligations laid out in the Guidelines on Money Laundering and the Financing of Terrorism, or for other reasons like transaction security of payment cards, many local merchants, when proceeding payment card transactions, may ask their clients to produce identification documents. Many merchants and customers find it doubtful or disputable whether the said procedure violates the Personal Data Protection Act (hereinafter as "PDPA"), in particular some merchants may collect and register cardholders' identification data during all these transactions. As a result, the Personal Data Protection Office (hereinafter as "GPDP") found it necessary to draw up guidelines for the concerned sectors to comply with the PDPA. Given the above, GPDP developed the Guidelines on Merchants' Processing of Identification Documents of Payment Cardholders. After two rounds of consultations with the banking industry, payment card institutions and the concerned public departments, the revised and refined Guidelines by GPDP are now published and intended as a reference for the concerned sectors. The Chinese, Portuguese and English versions of the Guidelines on Merchants' Processing of Identification Documents of Payment Cardholders are currently available for downloading at the Guidelines section of the GPDP website (www.gpdp.gov.mo).