If you are an account holder in State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender, there are a few changes that you need to be aware of. If you haven’t read about them, here they are:
1) Cut in MAB: The bank has decided to treat the metro and urban centres in the same category as far as average minimum account balance (MAB) maintenance is concerned. What this means is that the MAB in metro centres has been reduced to Rs 3,000 from Rs 5,000 earlier. For semi-urban branches, the MAB is Rs 2,000 and for rural branches Rs 1,000. So in case you are in metro centres, now you need to maintain the average MAB at Rs 3,000 from Sunday, 1 October.
Cut penalties for non-adherence: For non-maintenance of MAB, the charges have also been revised downwards ranging from 20-50 percent across all population groups and categories. Now, the charges at semi-urban and rural centres range from Rs 20 to Rs 40 and at urban and metro centres from Rs 30 to Rs 50, the bank has said. Earlier, in the metros, the bank was charging Rs 100 plus GST if the balance fell below 75 percent of the MAB of Rs 5,000. If the shortfall was 50 percent or less, the penalty charge was Rs 50 plus GST. Any shortfall in maintaining minimum average balance in rural areas was attracting a penalty in the range of Rs 20 to Rs 50 plus GST.
3) Categories exempted: The bank has decided to exempt pensioners, beneficiaries of social benefits from the government and minors from the requirement of minimum balance in savings account. The bank reiterated that basic savings bank deposit and PMs Jan-Dhan accounts are not required to maintain the minimum balance.
SBI has 42 crore savings bank accounts. Of this, 13 crore come under PMJDY/ BSBD. The revision is likely to benefit another 5 crore account holders, the bank has said.
4) Apart from this, if you hold account in State Bank of Patiala, State Bank of Bikaner and Jaipur, State Bank of Raipur, State Bank of Travancore, State Bank of Hyderabad or Bhartiya Mahila Bank (BMB), your cheque books will be come invalid from 1 October unless you have got a new one. The IFS code of your branch will also be different from that day. This is because these banks have been merged with SBI now.
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