KEY PROVISIONS OF RA 8484
Definition of Access Devices
RA 8484 broadly defines access devices as any card, plate, code, account number, or other
means of account access that can be used to obtain money, goods, services, or any other
thing of value or to initiate a transfer of funds
Prohibited Acts
The law specifies a comprehensive list of prohibited acts, including but not limited to:
(a) producing, using, trafficking in one or more counterfeit access devices;
(b) trafficking in one or more unauthorized access devices or access devices fraudulently
applied for;
(c) using, with intent to defraud, an unauthorized access device;
(d) using an access device fraudulently applied for;
(e) possessing one or more counterfeit access devices or access devices fraudulently applied
for;
(f) producing, trafficking in, having control or custody of, or possessing device-making or
altering equipment without being in the business or employment, which lawfully deals with
the manufacture, issuance, or distribution of such equipment;
(g) inducing, enticing, permitting or in any manner allowing another, for consideration or
otherwise to produce, use, traffic in counterfeit access devices, unauthorized access devices
or access devices fraudulently applied for;
(h) multiple imprinting on more than one transaction record, sales slip or similar document,
thereby making it appear that the device holder has entered into a transaction other than
those which said device holder had lawfully contracted for, or submitting, without being an
affiliated merchant, an order to collect from the issuer of the access device, such extra sales
slip through an affiliated merchant who connives therewith, or, under false pretenses of
being an affiliated merchant, present for collection such sales slips, and similar documents;
(i) disclosing any information imprinted on the access device, such as, but not limited to,
the account number or name or address of the device holder, without the latter's authority
or permission;
(j) obtaining money or anything of value through the use of an access device, with intent to
defraud or with intent to gain and fleeing thereafter;
(k) having in one's possession, without authority from the owner of the access device or the
access device company, an access device, or any material, such as slips, carbon paper, or
any other medium, on which the access device is written, printed, embossed, or otherwise
indicated;
(l) writing or causing to be written on sales slips, approval numbers from the issuer of the
access device of the fact of approval, where in fact no such approval was given, or where, if
given, what is written is deliberately different from the approval actually given;
(m) making any alteration, without the access device holder's authority, of any amount or
other information written on the sales slip;
(n) effecting transaction, with one or more access devices issued to another person or
persons, to receive payment or any other thing of value;
(o) without the authorization of the issuer of the access device, soliciting a person for the
purpose of:
1) offering an access device; or
2) selling information regarding or an application to obtain an access device; or
(p) without the authorization of the credit card system member or its agent, causing or
arranging for another person to present to the member or its agent, for payment, one or
more evidence or records of transactions made by credit card
.Penalties
Violations of RA 8484 carry severe penalties ranging from fines to imprisonment, depending
on the nature and gravity of the offense. The law also provides for higher penalties in cases
involving larger amounts of fraud or damage, as well as for repeat offenders.
Section 12. Frustrated and attempted access device fraud. – Any person who performs
all the acts of execution which would produce any of the unlawful acts enumerated in Section 9 of
this Act, but which nevertheless does not produce it by reason of causes independent of the
will of said person, shall be punished with two-thirds (2/3) of the fine and imprisonment
provided for the consummated offenses listed in said section. Any person who commences the
commission of any of the unlawful acts enumerated in Section 9 of this Act directly by overt acts
and does not perform all the acts of execution which would produce the said acts by reason
of some cause or accident other than said person's own spontaneous desistance, shall be
punished with one-half (1/2) of the fine and imprisonment provided for the consummated
offenses listed in the said section.
