RBI waits for things to settle down in AP

To set up an office after identification of capital city. As a practice, the RBI sets up its offices in all State capitals. "We will definitely have our office in Andhra Pradesh also. Let things settle down", Mr. Das told presspersons here on Wednesday.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is awaiting identification of the capital city for opening of its office in Andhra Pradesh. Right now, it is not thinking in that direction and moreover there is no request as yet from the Andhra Pradesh authorities.

“As of now we are operating from Hyderabad for both the States”, said K.P. Das, Regional Director, (RBI), AP and Telangana.

As a practice, the RBI sets up its offices in all State capitals. “We will definitely have our office in Andhra Pradesh also. Let things settle down”, Mr. Das told presspersons here on Wednesday.

Plastic currency

The RBI was also closely examining the pros and cons of introducing plastic currency. It was studying the use of plastic currency in countries such as Australia and Malaysia. The bank was very circumspect and had no plans to rush into plastic currency without evaluating its advantages and disadvantages vis-à-vis the paper currency. “It is in our agenda, but we can’t afford to be adventurous”, Mr. Das remarked.

Slight increase in complaints

Banking Ombudsman, Dr. N. Krishna Mohan, said post bifurcation he had jurisdiction over both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. There was a slight increase in the number of complaints from 4,303 in 2012-13 to 4,477 in 2013-14. Of this Telangana accounted for 53 per cent and Andhra Pradesh 47 per cent.

A major chunk of the complaints, almost 29 per cent, pertained to electronic banking and this was a cause for concern. There were increasing complaints about failed ATM withdrawals, fraudulent internet transactions through cloning of cards, harassment in collection of credit card dues and non-updating of CIBIL status. With a view to check the frauds, the RBI had introduced second factor authentication and EMV (Europay Master card and visa) card conforming to global standard for credit and debit payment, Mr. Mohan said.

There were also complaints pertaining to remittances, unreasonable charges, minimum balance, and foreclosure of accounts.

In 19 cases, the Ombudsman had issued awards in favour of customers to the tune of Rs. 13.93 lakh and all of them were implemented by the banks. Mr. Mohan recalled the case of a poor woman who lost her life’s savings when somebody siphoned off her money by cloning her ATM card. He found the complaint to be genuine and made the bank pay her lost amount of Rs. 60,000.

The RBI on its part was insisting on all financial institutions to follow the real time fraud monitoring system. But there were some minimum precautions which customers should take, Mr. Mohan said.