The State Bank of India today reduced its charges on non-maintenance of an average monthly balance (AMB) in savings account by up to 75 per cent, effective April 1.
The charges for non-maintenance of AMB for customers in metro and urban centres have been reduced from a maximum of Rs 50 per month plus goods and services tax (GST), to Rs 15 per month plus GST. The above revision will benefit 25 crore bank customers.
For semi-urban and rural centres, the charges have been reduced from Rs 40 per month plus GST to Rs 12 and Rs 10 per month plus GST, respectively, the bank said in a release.
Advertisement
"We have reduced these charges taking into account the feedback and sentiments of our customers," SBI's managing director (retail and digital banking) P K Gupta said.
"The bank has always focused on keeping the interests of its customers first and this is one of our many efforts towards fulfilling customers' expectations," he said.
A report from early this year said the country's largest lender collected Rs 1,771 crore during April- November 2017 as penalty from customers who couldn't maintain a minimum monthly average balance (MAB) in their accounts.
The money thus collected as penalty charges is more than the bank’s July-September quarter net profit of Rs 1,581.55 crore and nearly half of the Rs 3,586 crore it earned as net profit April-September.
Advertisement
Penalty for not maintaining minimum balance goes against the grain of financial inclusion.
Many on Twitter had called out the bank for 'charging the poor' while letting go the rich by writing off their loans.
The SBI also offers its customers to shift from a regular savings bank account to basic savings bank deposit account (BSBD) on which no charges are levied.
A customer always has the option of converting the regular savings bank account to BSBD account free of charge, in case he desires to avail basic savings bank facilities without being subject to maintenance of AMB, Gupta said.
The lender has 41 crore savings bank accounts, out of which 16 crore accounts under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna/ BSBD, and of pensioners/ minors/ social security benefit holders are already exempted from charges on non- maintenance of minimum balance.
(PTI inputs)
