Consumers now have 60 days to challenge debit orders

The dispute windows for all debit order instruments will be standardised at 60 days. This will simplify disputability, especially for service providers using multiple collection instruments. South Africans will soon have up to 60 days to challenge debit order payments.

This comes after theSouth African Reserve Bankand theFinancial Sector Conduct Authorityconfirmed the new rule standardising dispute periods across all debit order instruments. The rules will take effect from 13 April 2026, giving consumers more time to reverse transactions while simplifying processes for banks and service providers. Previously, South Africans had only 40 days to dispute debit orders.

Pieter Brand, Head of Product at Hyphen, said that “prior tothis, the rules governing how long a consumer could dispute a debit order varied across different collection instruments”. “In some cases,consumershad up to a year to challenge a transaction, triggering a costly, manual process between the debtor, the debtor’s bank, the service provider’s bank, and ultimately the service provider to prove the validity of the mandate”. He also said that under the new rules, no debit order can be disputed more than 60 days after it was processed.