Issue multi-city cheques, don’t levy charges: RBI to banks
MDT/PTI 11 August 2012

“All CBS-enabled banks are hereby advised to issue only ‘payable at par’/‘multi-city’ CTS 2010 standard cheques to all eligible customers,” the RBI said in a notification


Mumbai: With a view to improving customer services and speeding up fund transfer, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Friday asked all core banking solutions (CBS)-enabled banks to issue multi-city cheques to all eligible customers and refrain from levying clearing charges on them, reports PTI.
 
“All CBS-enabled banks are hereby advised to issue only ‘payable at par’/‘multi-city’ CTS 2010 standard cheques to all eligible customers,” RBI said in a notification.
 
A ‘payable at par’ or ‘multi-city’ cheque of a bank can be cleared by any branch of the same bank in the country. The process has significantly reduced the outstation cheque clearance time.
 
The notification has also directed the banks not to levy any charge for clearance of such multi-city cheques.
 
“Since such cheques (payable at par) are cleared as local cheques in clearing houses, customers should not be levied extra charges”, it added.
 
RBI has issued these directives in view of complaints that certain banks were issuing multi-city cheques with value cap or only to high net-worth customers.
 
“Instances of levying intersol charges when such cheques are cleared at other than the base branch city have also come to our notice,” it added.
 
The central bank in October 2007 had asked the CBS-enabled banks to make available the facility ‘payable at par’/‘multi-city’ cheques to all eligible and requesting customers.
 
There are about 35,000 CBS enabled branches.
 
The initiative was aimed at using the technology to speed up movement of funds throughout the country and also to improve customer services.
 
RBI has also asked the banks to put in place the appropriate board approved risk management procedures based on risk categorisation of accounts and post the updated policy in the regard on their websites.
Comments
MK Gupta
1 decade ago
Even earlier also, RBI had issued the circular DPSS.CO.CHD.No./1112/04.07.05/2011-12 dated December 27, 2011, followed by the Circular No.RBI/2012-13/190DPSS.CO.CHD.No. 399/04.07.05/2012-13 dt. 3.9.2012 on Standardisation and Enhancement of Security Features in Cheque Forms-Migrating to CTS 2010 standards and, despite this, no PSU bank, including and especially the State Bank of India cared to follow these guidelines. In fact, SBI, in open disregard to and with utter contempt towards the Guidelines of the RBI continued (and still does continue) follow its own rules inter alia in respect of the so called “Home Account” and :”Non-Home A/c” transactions and levy prohibitive charges on the latter. As per the Circular dt. 27.12.2011 itself, all SB customers of all Banks including the SBI ought to have extended the facility of issuing Multi City charges and, by continuing to disregard the same, even in utter disregard for the Circular dt. 3.9.2012 in accordance with which the said facility was automatically available to all customers of SBI w.e.f. 1.10.2012, the bank has illegally and unethically collected from the hapless account holders huge charges which, in legal terms, constitute “UNJUST ENRICHMENT” and must be refunded to all concerned. The amount must be running into hundreds of crores, if judged by the separate huge ques outside all SBI branches (especially in the tiny Kalkaji branch of SBI in Delhi) of the labour class people from outside the NCT seeking to deposit or withraw into/from their “Non-Home” a/cs!

Will SBI refund the income illegally earned and unjustly enrich itself by ignoring with contempt the Guidelines of the central Bank of India?

I would request Moneylife to make a special study on this and with speciasl reference to the anti-people attitude of SBI for the public at large and its readers.
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