Brief: WEstpac refunds, Monoova raids Braintree, RBNZ eases whistleblower path

Westpac NZ will pay thousands of customers a total of NZ$3.7 million after a credit card processing error, as part of a settlement with the New Zealand Commerce Commission. As the result of a computer error (which meant customers were not sent a vital physical letter), 19,000 new customers were not provided with disclosure information about their credit terms, when they were issued credit cards between May 2017 and March 2018 - a breach of the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act. Westpac self-reported the problem to the regulator in March 2018.

New Zealand based cryptocurrency exchange Cryptopia likely breached anti-money laundering laws before it was hacked, its liquidators have told the High Court at Christchurch, reports RNZ. Cryptopia was liquidated in May, following a hack of its systems in January last year that reportedly stole up to NZ$24m.The liquidators said the business did not meet its legal requirements when setting up new customer accounts. Internet location addresses showed most of Cryptopia's 2.2m customers were based in the US, Russia, Britain, India, and the Netherlands, as well as Germany, Japan, Canada, Brazil and South Korea. Thousands of accounts holding more than $3m were traced back to uninhabited tropical islands near Australia, or could not be traced back to any location.

Payments processing company Monoova (formerly MoneyTech Payments) has hired Tyson Hackwood to be its head of growth. Hackwood joins from PayPal's Braintree, where he was head of Asia Pacific. Monoova was launched by Moneytech Group in 2017. Its target market is companies with large transaction flows that want to manage payments automatically.

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand has set up a designated email address and phone number specifically for whistleblowers from within regulated entities. Employees or former employees of insurers, banks and non-bank deposit takers can report misconduct directly to whistleblowing@rbnz.govt.nz or call a designated Wellington number