The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas on Wednesday warned the public against the increasing cases of “pasalo-benta” scheme perpetrated by carnapping syndicates targeting vulnerable buyers who are hoping to save money on their purchase and sellers who need to transfer their liabilities.
Under this scheme, a syndicate member would buy a vehicle from a seller with an agreement to assume payments for the auto loan. However, the syndicate member has no intention of paying the remaining amortizations and will sell/dispose of the vehicle to an end-buyer to gain profit using falsified documents, giving the end-buyer no rights over the vehicle.
As a result, the original seller defaults on his/her auto loan and the car gets repossessed leaving the end-buyer with nothing.
The BSP on Aug. 26 issued a memorandum for its supervised financial institutions on organized crimes through auto loans. The directive called on financial institutions to prevent these crimes by reinforcing the conduct of customer identification and verification procedures as part of the customer due diligence.
It also identified other types of car-related illegal activities, including the rent-tangay, rent-sangla, loan accommodator scheme and labas-casa scheme.
The Philippine National Police also warned against syndicates that acquire high-end motor vehicles through auto loans under fictitious circumstances. These crimes are done through fabricated conduction stickers, plate numbers, identities, and falsified documents, such as identification cards and employment certificates, to successfully avail of auto loans.
Carnapping syndicates sometimes resort to identity theft by using an actual person’s name, address and company profile, but with a different photo.
The BSP advised financial institutions to strictly observe and strengthen the implementation of Anti-Money Laundering regulations on customer identification and verification procedures, ongoing monitoring of customers and their transactions, suspicious transaction reporting, and continuing AML training program including controls relating to partner/accredited car dealers.
Financial institutions were also asked to file suspicious transaction reports.