THE beleaguered Australian firearms industry is under attack once again, this time from ANZ Bank, which has pulled payment services from gun shops.
According to the Shooting Industry Foundation of Australia (SIFA), the banking giant has informed a number of firearms businesses in Australia that it will no longer provide them with merchant services due to its “Payment Solutions Policy”, effective more or less immediately.
A letter sent to affected ANZ customers and viewed by SIFA advised that the bank’s “Payment Solutions policy and Card Scheme Rules strictly prohibit the sale of weapons online to ensure that customers who purchase weapons attend in-store to provide appropriate licence and permits checks, as is required by relevant laws.”
This policy was cited despite Australian laws that ensuring firearms can only be sold over the counter in gun shops to permit-holding buyers.
SIFA president James Walsh Walsh pointed out that regardless of how a payment is made, every legal firearm transaction in Australia must be done via a licensed firearms dealer or armourer to a police-checked firearms license holder, who has the appropriate police-issued licences or permits to purchase the gun.
“By removing the ability for licensed dealers to accept certain payments by credit card, all it does it make it harder for businesses to transact with their customers, meaning they will need to source other, often less secure, payment alternatives,” Mr Walsh said.
“Regardless of what ANZ purports, this decision is simply a social restraint of trade on a legal and highly regulated industry.”
Mr Walsh said SIFA had questioned ANZ representatives on the issue and been told the decision was a result of ANZ merging its merchant services business with international payment provider Worldline, who reportedly have a global policy not to provide their services to businesses in the firearms or weapons industry.
Shooters Union Australia president Graham Park said Shooters Union was appalled by the news, was undertaking its own verification of the situation, and would be making formal representations to ANZ once the facts had been ascertained.
“The banking industry in this country really has it out for law-abiding firearms users, and we simply can’t fathom why that is,” he said.
“This is at least the third time in the past couple of years we’ve had issues with a bank deciding to deny services to the shooting industry
“Considering the major banks appear to have no issues providing financial services to the adult entertainment industry or the pubs and gambling industry, and were the subject of a Royal Commission into industry misconduct, I’d suggest they should be taking a long, hard look at some of their policies and leave their personal views on legal industries out of the equation.
“We’re not going to sit by and twiddle our thumbs while our industry is attacked once again by virtue signallers who seem to forget we’re real people with real businesses and real livelihoods.”
The full media release from SIFA is here.
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