On 1985, China Bank first issued the "Bank of China Card" in Guangdong by Zhuhai Branch, and then issued the "Great Wall Card" and "Great Wall Visa Card" nationwide. China Industrial and Commercial Bank issued "Cotton Tree Card" in Guangzhou on 1987, and then began to issue "Peony Card" and "Peony MasterCard" nationwide. 1990 In May, the People's Construction Bank of China issued "CCB MasterCard" in Guangzhou, and then began to issue "Dragon Card" nationwide; Bank of Communications 1992 issued Pacific Card; Agricultural Bank of China issued Jinsui Card in 1993, followed by Jinsui MasterCard. Up to now, according to the latest statistics of the Survey and Statistics Department of the Head Office of the People's Bank of China, there are more than 20 types of credit cards issued in China, with a total card issuance of about 20 million, and the personal card issuance is about12 million, accounting for about 1% of the total population in China. From this point of view, credit cards still have a fairly broad market in China. Through the investigation of the credit card market, I think there are many problems in the development of China's credit card market due to various factors, mainly in the following five aspects:
1. Insufficient publicity Credit card is a product of economic development and a well-known payment tool for women and children in developed countries. With the deepening of China's economic system reform and the continuous development of socialist market economy, bank credit cards will become an indispensable "companion" in the lives of urban and rural residents in China. However, due to insufficient publicity, the general public has poor knowledge and business about how to handle credit cards and how to use them.
2. Complicated card processing procedures At present, although various banks have issued various credit cards, customers often have to go through complicated procedures when handling credit cards, and then they have to wait for a long time, which brings many difficulties to some customers who are eager to use credit cards.
3. The problem of special outlets is firstly the number of special outlets. When the number of special outlets in a city is less than a certain number, it will generally make cardholders feel that many things remain unchanged. Finally, cash is the most convenient. Secondly, the distribution of outlets, if the distribution of outlets is uneven, it will make cardholders feel very troublesome. You must use cash when shopping in a certain place, and you can use a credit card when spending in a certain place, so you must think clearly every time you go out shopping or spending. Third, the service attitude and quality of special outlets are very important. If the service quality of customers' credit card spending is poor, and the time of credit card spending is much longer than that of cash spending, then there will definitely not be too many people willing to use credit cards, which is very unfavorable to the development of credit cards.
4. Inconvenient consumption by credit card In China, due to the low level of financial electronization, the application of computers in credit card business has just started. When accepting a large number of credit card business, both banks and special merchants rely on manual processing, rely on eyes and experience to identify the authenticity of credit cards, and determine whether credit cards are valid by consulting the "blacklist" (stop payment list) sent a few days or even weeks ago. Press the card manually to make the bill, and ask the issuing bank for it by local or long-distance telephone. Because of the lack of training, the operation is very unskilled, or because the authorized phone can't get through, the cardholder is often kept waiting for several minutes or even dozens of minutes, and the advantages of credit card such as speed, convenience and flexibility are not reflected at all, which greatly dampened the cardholder's enthusiasm for spending credit cards. Nowadays, ATMs are installed in many places, but due to poor public awareness of protection, low quality of users and inadequate maintenance, many ATMs are broken and just a decoration. At the same time, due to the lack of networking between ATM and banks, ATM and ATM can only provide a few relatively single functions, which cannot prevent cardholders from using ATM to maliciously overdraw.
5. The security of credit card The security of credit card is not only the concern of users, but also the security of bank funds. At present, there are many problems, such as fake cards, invalid cards, fraudulent use of other people's credit cards and so on. Once a credit card is stolen or lost, you need to go to the bank to report the loss in writing, which is generally cumbersome. Before the loss report comes into effect, the credit card is illegally withdrawn or fraudulently used, and the bank is not responsible, so the cardholder's funds cannot be guaranteed.
Second, the development prospects of the credit card market in China
With the efforts of commercial banks for several years, the credit card market in China has developed greatly and initially formed a certain scale. The mainstream is good, which has played a positive role in promoting the development of market economy and banking business. However, whether from the percentage of cardholders in the total population or from the percentage of credit card consumption in the total national consumption, it is far from enough compared with economically developed countries. The credit card market not only has a broad market in China, but also we have to enter the international market, so the development of credit cards has a long way to go. In order to make China's credit card market have a great development and gradually catch up with or approach the international level, we should do the following work in combination with China's national conditions.
1, the unified management of credit cards is the inevitable product of the development of the market to a certain extent, and its inherent requirement is a unified and orderly big market. Therefore, when developing credit card business in China, we must adhere to the principles of unified planning, unified leadership and unified management. Organizationally, China Credit Card Company was established under the unified leadership of the People's Bank of China (the central bank), with the participation of commercial banks, to coordinate the mutual cooperation and support among commercial banks, formulate the name, articles of association, badge and accounting system of credit cards, and be responsible for the settlement system, authorization system and payment stop system of credit cards in the same city and in different places. Credit card companies have the right to correct and punish violations of financial regulations and credit card regulations.
2. Accelerate the construction of financial electronization and unify technical specifications. Under the premise of unified management, in order to better develop the credit card business and open up the credit card market in China, China Credit Card Company should formulate the credit card development plan and policy as soon as possible, and technically formulate a set of technical specifications for credit cards to break the current situation of fragmentation, different technical specifications and repeated investment in equipment caused by institutional reasons. According to the Master Plan of Financial Electronization in China formulated by the Financial Electronization Company of the People's Bank of China, during the Ninth Five-Year Plan period, China will begin to implement a nationwide credit card networking project called "Golden Card Project", with the ultimate goal of speeding up the construction of financial electronization and adopting a gradual networking mode with the help of the development of post and telecommunications. Let special merchants connect with local credit card issuers through public packet switched network (PDN), digital data network (DDN) and integrated service digital network (ISDN), and the credit card issuers connect with superior banks, which in turn connect with credit card branches in the same city. By using the satellite electronic interbank system that the People's Bank of China has put into use, a national and even global credit card online network centered on Beijing will be formed, realizing real-time authorization and timely liquidation. No matter when and where credit card holders spend money, credit card online network can provide cardholders with fast, convenient and accurate services. Through simple operations such as swiping the card and inputting the consumption amount, it integrates blacklist inquiry, authorization, liquidation and remittance, which can bring great convenience to merchants and individuals. At the same time, commercial banks should do a good job in ideological work and training of special merchants, invite them to jointly invest, build ATM networks and POS networks suitable for the development of credit cards, gradually realize the automatic processing of credit card business, strive to improve the security of credit cards technically, provide quality services to customers, and objectively create conditions for the development and popularization of credit cards.
3. Accelerate the development of special merchants. At present, among the 65,438+10,000 special merchants in China, about 15% do not accept business at all, 15% rarely handle a business a year, and some special merchants who often handle business are generally unfamiliar and unskilled. In view of these situations, the issuing bank should strengthen publicity, let more merchants accept credit cards, and let more merchants accept credit cards well through training. On the premise of consolidating the existing special merchants, we will actively develop railway, aviation, medical and health care, insurance and social welfare undertakings such as highway maintenance fees, post and telecommunications fees, public utilities, gas fees, pensions and other charging fields. Form a network of special merchants with large quantity, high quality, complete industry and reasonable layout.
4. Strengthen the popularization of credit card knowledge. At present, the public generally lacks credit card knowledge. Credit card issuers need to widely publicize and popularize credit card knowledge through various means and media as soon as possible so that everyone can understand, apply for and use credit cards. Let every store accept credit cards, and through appropriate discounts, credit card consumption can enjoy certain discounts, thus stimulating the development of credit cards.
5. Simplify the card processing procedures. In the future, after the public security department implements the magnetic card ID card, the whole process of applying for a credit card can actually be handled by a computer. First, the identity of the applicant and guarantor can be verified in time by reading the contents on the magnetic cards of the applicant's and guarantor's identity cards, and the forms filled in by the applicant can be scanned and input. If there are no mistakes, the computer can automatically check the applicant's identity and form, and you can apply for a credit card immediately, which can greatly shorten the card processing cycle.
6. Use advanced computer multimedia technology to ensure the safety of users' funds by collecting the voice and fingerprints of cardholders. Report the loss of stolen or lost credit cards in cities all over the country, and report the loss by fingerprint verification, which provides better protection for the cardholder's financial security.
7. Reform the credit card marketing system. Credit card marketing means that credit card institutions or issuing banks publicize the knowledge of credit cards to the public, and introduce the characteristics and functions of credit cards to the public in a specific way, thus arousing public interest and stimulating the public's desire to apply for and receive credit cards, thus expanding all activities and means of credit card issuance and trading. According to the experience of foreign credit card market development, commercial banks that issue credit cards should reform the past credit card marketing methods and establish a set of complete credit card marketing policies. Mainly should do the following:
(1) It is clear that the marketing strategy should determine the scale of the credit card market, the main card issuers, the card issuing target this year, the expected amount of credit card consumption, etc. According to the business scope of the issuing bank, the articles of association of the credit card and the characteristics of the credit card issued. Through publicity, innovation, increasing functions, giving convenience to special merchants and giving appropriate discounts to consumers, the purpose of developing special merchants, increasing the number of cards issued and increasing the amount of credit card consumption can be achieved. Of course, the determination of marketing strategy should also fully consider its own ability, market effect and the proportional relationship between input and output, and can not act blindly.
(2) Expanding advertising is actually a promotional activity to spread certain goods and services to the public through certain media and certain universal, artistic, scientific and professional ways. Credit card advertising is no exception. Each card-issuing bank should formulate a clear advertising strategy. Through radio, television, newspapers, building billboards and other advertising media. Make use of civilized, elegant, humorous and intuitive words, graphics and images to widely publicize to the public in different time and space, so that the public can establish a clear image of credit card issuing banks and their credit cards, thus stimulating consumers' enthusiasm for applying for and using credit cards and achieving the purpose of credit card promotion.
(3) To build a high-quality marketing team, we should build a high-quality marketing professional team. According to China's national conditions, the staff engaged in credit card marketing should love credit card marketing and be enterprising; Have extensive professional knowledge of credit card business marketing.
Industry knowledge and skilled credit card marketing technology; It is necessary to have the ability to understand and accurately grasp the cardholder's economic situation, psychological activities and behavioral laws in a timely manner; Strong credit card marketing concept, good at communicating various economic and financial information between economic themes; Enthusiastic service attitude, providing quality service for cardholders; Have a strong body and good physical quality.
I believe that after several years of exploration, the efforts of bank employees, the support from all walks of life, the continuous development of communication technology and electronic technology, and the "Gold Card Project" as the ultimate goal, the credit card market in China will surely develop rapidly in the near future. At the same time, China's credit cards will also go to the international market and the world. "One card in hand, all over the world" will not be far away.