Someone found a way to make the company scrip scam actually legal, by using a bank as the entity issuing the scrip and taking the profit from it. Not quite as good as doing it themselves, but still a far sight better than having to pay someone all of their wages.

And like all other corporate shenanigans, it's "optional", just that you have to be educated and willing to slog through something designed to screw you to get out of it. No surprises here that it's being used in places where the workforce is unlikely to have he education or language skills to get out. And probably don't have any labor union nearby to advocate for them.