CBA Under Fire Over 13 Years of Unauthorised Fees on Inactive and Destroyed Credit Card

The Quick Take

• Commonwealth Bank of Australia charged 13 consecutive years of fees on an inactive credit card that had been returned and physically destroyed
• Staff were unable to identify CBA itself as the merchant responsible for the unauthorised fee charges
• The case raises fresh questions about CBA's dormant account governance amid ongoing post-Royal Commission scrutiny

Commonwealth Bank of Australia attracted significant attention after reports emerged that the lender had been charging an undisclosed fee for 13 consecutive years on an inactive credit card that had long since been returned to sender and physically destroyed. CBA's own staff were reportedly unable to identify the bank as the merchant responsible for the charges — a breakdown in internal fee governance that underscores systemic weaknesses in dormant account management. Australia's banking sector has been under sustained scrutiny since the 2018 Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry, and recurring governance failures continue to keep regulators and advocacy groups on heightened alert.

For CBA, which trades at a premium valuation to Australian banking peers on expectations of operational quality and governance discipline, each new misconduct case risks compressing the premium multiple the market is willing to assign. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has demonstrated willingness to pursue enforcement action against the major banks for fee-related misconduct in the post-Royal Commission era, and an investigation into dormant account practices — if CBA is not alone in this pattern — could expose the big four Australian banks to significant remediation costs. ANZ, NAB, and Westpac investors will watch whether regulators treat this as an isolated CBA matter or trigger an industry-wide sweep of inactive account fee practices.

The immediate forward signal is whether ASIC or the Australian Financial Complaints Authority formally investigates or acts on the CBA dormant-account fee case. CBA's next half-year results should include any disclosure of remediation provisions if an internal review finds the fee practice extended beyond the single reported account. The macro variable is Australia's broader banking reform trajectory: if government financial services policy moves toward stricter dormant account rules or mandatory fee refund frameworks, all major Australian banks would face both compliance costs and the prospect of significant historical remediation across millions of dormant accounts.

Synthesized from 2 sources.