Cash transactions: PNB not to levy charges for now

Vijay C Roy

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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 7

With the government asking SBI and other lenders to reconsider levying charges on cash transactions and ATM withdrawals above a certain limit, public sector lender PNB has adopted wait-and-watch policy. At the same time, the bank has said, it is strengthening its digital infrastructure and plans to launch digital bank within bank.

“Some of the banks have increased charges and fee on various services, but at the same time there is a request from the government to reconsider the decision. We don’t have any plan to introduce charges and fees on services as of now. However, I must say in order to move to digital channel, there is a cost attached to it,” said Usha Ananthasubramanian, MD & CEO, Punjab National Bank. She was in Panchkula today to distribute sewing machines to the SC women beneficiaries who were trained by Rural Self Employment Training Institute, Panchkula.

The government yesterday asked the SBI to reconsider its decision to levy penalty on non-maintenance of minimum balance. The bank has announced imposing a penalty ranging from Rs 20 to Rs 100 on non-maintenance of Minimum Average Balance (MAB) in savings bank accounts from April 1. Some private banks such as HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and Axis Bank have already started charging a minimum amount of Rs 150 per transaction for cash deposits and withdrawals beyond four free transactions in a month.

On being asked about digital infrastructure the bank is planning to develop, she said, “Brick and mortar branch model can’t be eliminated. To promote digital adoption, we are planning to launch digital bank within bank. We are working on the modalities and it is likely to take a year.”

After the demonetisation, the bank has received deposits worth Rs 93,000 crore. She said out of this, Rs 14,000 crore was deposited in loan accounts and Rs 200 crore to settle NPA accounts.

When asked about the reasons for low credit offtake, she said, “There are three main reasons behind it. First, the economy is not picking up as anticipated. Second, no new projects are coming up and thirdly bond market is getting stronger. However, we will continue to focus on agriculture, MSE and retail sector which is perennial cluster to boost credit offtake.”

She said the bank has identified assets worth Rs 1,800 crore which will be sold by the month-end to recover bad loans.