United Bank of India opens 50 branches in Assam

United Bank of India has recently inaugurated 50 branches in Assam. The branches were inaugurated by Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi.

UBI was also looking to add six more branches in the region to take its branch tally there to 250, Archana Bhargava, the Bank’s Chairperson and Managing Director, was quoted as saying in a press release. Its current branch strength in Assam stands at 244.

According to her, the bank would open one more regional office at Tezpur in addition to the five existing ones at Guwahati, Nagaon, Sibsagar, Dibrugarh and Cachar.

abhishek.l@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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ICICI bank cuts home loan rates to 10.25%

ICICI Bank, India’s largest private lender reduced interest on home loans by 15 basis points at 10.25 per cent.

The bank has introduced a 'special scheme' that will offer home loans up to Rs 75 lakh at 10.25 per cent rate. The rates for home loans above Rs 75 lakh will be at 10.50 per cent, an ICICI official said confirming the news.

For existing ICICI bank customers, interest rates remain at 10.40 per cent for upto Rs 75 lakh and 10.65 per cent for loan above Rs 75 lakh.

The offer will be available till January 31, 2014 with immediate effect.

The base rate of ICICI Bank is at 10 per cent.

This move comes after State Bank of India and HDFC also reduced their base rates a day after the RBI maintained a status quo on key policy rates.

Public sector lender, SBI also pared interest rate on home loans by 15-20 basis points.

Even as it cut the home loan rates, SBI raised the slabs for home loans in view of the rising property prices, especially in metros. The new slabs are – up to Rs 75 lakhs (up to Rs 30 lakh earlier) and above Rs 75 lakh (above Rs 30 lakh earlier).

Henceforth, a uniform interest rate of 10.15 per cent will be charged on home loans up to Rs 75 lakh (against the current rate of 10.30 per cent for loans up to Rs 30 lakh).

SBI will charge 10.30 per cent interest on home loans above Rs 75 lakh (against the current rate of 10.50 per cent for loans above Rs 30 lakh).

HDFC reduced rates by 25 bps for home loans availed before January 31, 2013. The interest rate charged is 10.25 per cent for loans up to Rs 75 lakh.

"HDFC has announced a special winter bonanza for its home loan customers effective Friday, December 20. This is a limited period offer and is valid for all new applications submitted before January 31, 2014 and first disbursement taken by February 28, 2014," HDFC said in a statement earlier this week.

beena.parmar@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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Govt ups stake in Corporation Bank

The Central Government has increased its stake in Corporation Bank to 63.33 per cent.

The bank informed BSE on Friday that the Securities Allotment Committee of the board of the bank at its meeting on December 20 has allotted 1,46,27,486 equity shares of Rs 10 each at a premium of Rs 297.64 a share to Government of India on a preferential basis.

With this, the bank’s issued and subscribed capital has expanded to 16,75,41,877 equity shares, and Government’s holding in the lender moved up from 59.82 per cent to 63.33 per cent.

The allotment was made following the consent given by the bank’s shareholders at its extraordinary general meeting on December 16, the bank said.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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Vijaya Bank bonds fully subscribed

Public sector lender Vijaya Bank’s Tier-II bond issue has been fully subscribed.

The bank raised Rs 250 crore through private placement of bonds.

The issue opened on December 17 and closed on December 20.

Brickwork Rating had assigned a stable outlook (AA+) for the bank’s bond issue.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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E-lounge at Canara Bank

The first Canara Bank Pune Circle’s e-lounge was recently inaugurated by V.S. Krishna Kumar, Executive Director of the Bank, at Deccan Gymkhana. This is among 50 e-lounges across India, and many more will be opened shortly, he said.

Observing that the Bank provides advanced technological facilities for its clientele, Krishna Kumar requested the customers to make best use of the technology products including online opening of SB accounts.

The security guarded e-lounge is provided with Cash Deposit machine, Cash withdrawal machine, Cheque deposit machine, Passbook Printing Machine, Internet Banking and Online Trading facilities which are available to customers 24 X 7.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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NHB tax-free bonds issue to open on Dec 30

National Housing Bank’s tax free bonds issue will open on December 30, R.V. Verma, Chairman & Managing Director, has said.

The issue size including greenshoe option will be Rs 2,100 crore, Verma told Business Line adding that the formal prospectus is likely to be filed with SEBI on Monday.

The coupon rates that will be offered for these tax-free bonds will be decided soon, Verma added.

NHB has already mobilised Rs 900 crore through private placement of tax free bonds this fiscal.

The proposed issue will be the first public issue of tax-free bonds by NHB this fiscal.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes had allowed NHB to mobilise Rs 3,000 crore through tax-free bonds during the current fiscal.

srivats.kr@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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Canara Bank to open New York branch

Canara Bank has received licence to open a branch in New York. According to R. K. Dubey, Chairman and Managing Director, Canara Bank, the Board of Governors of the US Federal Reserve has approved the proposal of the bank to open a branch. The bank, he said, could get the approval of US regulators in a record 20 months from date of filing the application. The bank is taking steps to hasten the process of opening the branch in New York and commence operations, he added.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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Bank strike hits financial transactions in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh

Financial transactions came to a halt in banks in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh as employees of public sector banks went on a day-long strike to press for various demands including wage revision.

Much to the inconvenience of harried customers, protesting bank employees under the banner of United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) even locked some branches from outside here in UT Chandigarh and Punjab not to allow any banking transaction to take place.

Due to strike, cheques worth several crore of rupees remained uncleared while transactions like cash withdrawal, cash and cheque deposits were affected.

Industrial sector including MSME and large enterprises in Punjab and Haryana said their business transactions were hampered due to the strike.

Protesting bank employees carried out protest rallies and demonstrations at several places including Ludhiana to press for their demands.

"Our intention is not to harass customers by observing the strike. But we are left with no option except to go on strike as our demands like wage hike have not been met for long," Punjab Bank Employees' Federation, Secretary, Naresh Gaur said.


Source: EconomicTimes

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HDFC Bank seeks change in criteria for giving ranks in Punjab

Expressing displeasure over not being in Punjab government's top 10 banks list, private lender HDFC Bank sought tweaking in criteria for giving ranks to banks for alloting government business.

"The state (Punjab) government should bring competition among banks (for ranking purpose) which will help the state... we want those parameters which should encourage banks to focus on the state," HDFC Bank Branch Banking Head (North) Govind Pandey told reporters here.

HDFC Bank, which has 400 branches in Punjab, will seek from state government consideraion of the bank's network or branch strength and size of business in the state while ranking any bank for allocating business.

"Bank's network or branches in the state, size of business in the state...these things should also be taken into consideration," he added.


The bank also sought to differentiate large or commercial banks with cooperative or small banks while working out rank for any bank as later normally have less presence or branch strength. "Cooperative banks should be put in separate category (for ranking purpose)," he said.

He said that the matter would soon be taken up with the appropriate authority for bringing change in the parameters.

The Punjab government had decided that it would allocate government business, including placement of deposits to banks as per ranking done by the state.

As per latest ranking done by the Punjab government, Punjab State Cooperative Bank has replaced HDFC bank by acquiring first rank among the list of top 10 banks in the state. HDFC bank is not in the new list of top 10 banks.

During last ranking done by the state six months back, HDFC Bank had secured first position in the ranking list.

The state government, currently, considers achievement of national goals set by RBI towards lending to priority sector, agriculture, weaker section and credit deposit ratio by banks in Punjab to give ranks.

Banks vie hard among themselves for acquiring sizeable government business, including heavy deposits, advances, salaries, etc.

HDFC Bank at present handles about Punjab government's business to the tune of Rs 1,000 crore including one lakh accounts of state police department.

The bank, which today opened its 400 branch at Jhanjheri in Mohali district, plans to ramp up branch strength in the state by adding 150 more branches in next one year.

"Our focus will be to further penetrate in semi-urban and rural areas to cover unbank and underbank areas in Punjab," Pandey said.


HDFC, which has about 81 per cent of its network dedicated to semi-urban and rural areas, has deposits and advances to the tune of Rs 11,210 crore and Rs 10,535 crore, respectively in Punjab as on September 30, 2013.

Source: EconomicTimes

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One-day strike criples banking operation

Banking operation was crippled on Wednesday as bank employees observed a one-day strike demanding early wage settlement and opposing banking sector reforms.

The impact of the strike was more prominent in the eastern and southern sectors. ATMs remained closed in Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.
The bank unions called the strike after rejecting Indian Banks' Association's offer of a 5% salary hike and they would chalk out future plans on December 23 in Hyderabad to intensify pressure on the managements' body. The wage revision for government bank employees is due since November 2012.

At the last tripartite wage settlement in 2007 which expired in October 2012, bank employees received a 18% hike in salaries.

"If there is no positive response from IBA and the government, employees may resoirt to further agitation including strikes," said Rajen Nagar, president of All India Bank Employees Association, the largest bank union representing almost half of 10 lakh bank employees including officers and subordinated staff.

Reserve Bank of India employees and officers organized huge rallies before all RBI offices including central office at Mumbai in support of the United Forum of Bank Unions or UFBU, the umbrella body for nine major bank unions and refuting the Financial Sector Legislative Reforms Commission recommendations of taking away some functions of RBI.

"The rallies strongly repudiated Finance Minister's public announcement in Mumbai on December 14th on Government's decision to implement the recommendations of FSLRC of March 2013 and take away immediately several important functions and powers of the country's central bank and vest those functions with the government and/or separate agencies," said Samir Ghosh, general secretary of RBI's employees association.

Source: EconomicTimes

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Oriental Bank welcomes policy announcement

Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC) has hailed the RBI’s mid-quarter policy announcement on Wednesday, stating that keeping the policy rates unchanged was a “positive surprise’’.

This public sector lender has no immediate plan to revise both the lending and deposit rates, S.L. Bansal, Chairman & Managing Director, OBC, told Business Line.

“Our rates will be stable for sometime.’’

Bansal pointed out that food and vegetable prices had nothing to do with monetary policy and it was from the perspective of core inflation (which is about 7 per cent) that markets had mainly expected a repo rate hike.

But with RBI seemingly comfortable about the current core inflation level, it had opted not to change the policy rates.

“The policy rates have remained unchanged and that is why the markets have positively reacted. It is a positive development for the markets,’’ Bansal said.

srivats.kr@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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RBI for removal of restrictions on gold import

Advocating removal of restriction on gold import as it encourages smuggling, Reserve Bank today said efforts should be made to maintain the present level of Current Account Deficit (CAD) without any significant curbs on inward shipments.

"I would be much happier if we had the kind of CAD we have without significant curbs on anything, including gold. We should aim to have a CAD without any distortions, removing the incentives for smuggling, that is what we will be working for,” he told a press conference here.

CAD, which is the difference between the inflow and outflow of foreign currency, had touched a record high of $88.2 billion or 4.8 per cent of GDP last fiscal.

The Government hiked import duty on gold to 10 per cent and the RBI also imposed curbs on its imports by linking it with exports.

With this, the CAD was brought down to 1.2 per cent in the July-September quarter, from 4.9 per cent in Q1.

In the first half, the CAD stood at $26.9 billion (3.1 per cent of GDP), down from $37.9 billion (4.5 per cent of GDP) in H1 of 2012-13.

"At this point, I feel very comfortable with where we are on CAD," Rajan said.

The Government and the RBI expect to contain CAD at $56 billion.

On an earlier occasion, the Governor had expressed concern that there was spurt in gold smuggling and was being paid for through the hawala channel.

Government expects gold imports to drop to 500 tonnes in the current fiscal as against 845 tonnes last year on account of measures taken by it along with the RBI.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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Kotak Bank rolls out financial inclusion plan for Amul workers

Mumbai-headquartered Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd on Tuesday rolled out a financial inclusion programme for 75 milk co-operatives of Amul in the Burdwan and Hooghly districts of West Bengal. The programme called ‘Kotak Samriddhi’, will help ensure farmers getting paid for their daily produce through direct transfer of money on the same day. At present, it takes three days for farmers to get paid for their produce.

Amul is a brand owned by Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd.

“Approximately, 8,000 farmers supplying milk to Amul through these cooperatives will benefit through the programme,” Tushar Trivedi, Executive Vice-President, Kotak Mahindra Bank, said.

Kotak has tied up with the National Payment Corporation of India for using their RuPay platform for issuing pre-paid cards.

Farmers need not necessarily have a bank account with Kotak Mahindra to obtain payments. However, co-operative societies need to have accounts with the bank.

Replicating the mode

Kotak, which began the pilot project on financial inclusion in the State, will now roll out a similar scheme for Amul in Gujarat in the next two months.

Over three lakh dairy farmers across 1,200 co-operative societies in the Gujarat will be part of the programme.

“In Gujarat, roll-out will happen in a phased manner,” Trivedi said. Kotak is also talking to other co-operative societies in Haryana and Punjab for extending the initiative to wheat and paddy.

Talks are, however, in a nascent stage.

abhishek.l@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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PSU banks themselves responsible for NPAs, not government: FM P Chidambaram

Blaming "tardy" state-run banks for high level of non-performing assets, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said banks' boards and not the government should be held responsible for the situation.

"If the bank boards cannot perform their duty, blame should stop with the bank boards and not with the government," he said at a panel discussion at an event to commemorate NSE's 20th anniversary here.

He acknowledged that the government has a nominee director in every public sector bank, but pointed out the roles of the independent directors, full-time directors, chairmen and managing directors and senior bank management.

During his three stints in the finance ministry, running into eight years, he has never interfered with the working of a bank, Chidambaram said.

"NPAs are high because the recovery measures are soft. Bankers are being tardy and to some extent soft on recovery. We have failing companies and prosperous promoters," he said.

Gross NPAs of banks crossed 4 per cent as of the September quarter at Rs 2.37 trillion and are projected to cross 4.4 per cent or Rs 2.9 trillion by the end of the fiscal, according to a report by rating agency Icra. Most NPAs are being generated by the state-run banks. United Bank of India has an NPA level of over 7 per cent, while SBI has over 5 per cent NPAs.

The minister also said that the RBI and the government have taken serious note of the issue and asked banks to expedite recoveries aggressively. State Bank has set up a separate vertical to tackle NPAs, he noted.

Chidambaram also said it is not fair to compare NPAs in the current context with the levels of the past, as in 2004, when the numbers were lower.

On capital infusion in state-run banks, Chidambaram said the infusion will continue even as bad assets rise because of the rate at which the overall assets of the banks are growing.


Source: Economic Times

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LIC Housing Finance will meet bank licence norms: Sunita Sharma, MD & CEO

LIC Housing Finance's first woman MD & CEO, Sunita Sharma, is confident of the company meeting all of Reserve Bank of India's criteria for a bank licence. According to Sharma, the company is prepared to transfer various businesses under a holding company as required by RBI.

If successful in its bid, LICHF will convert into a bank and come under a holding company which will also own LICHFL Care Homes and LIC Financial Services — a distribution company. Both of these are at present subsidiaries of LICHF.

"LICHF is a separate private company and the application for a bank licence does not involve the Life Insurance Corporation of India," said Sharma . "We do not have any problems in meeting any of the eligibility criteria as we are a highly compliant company."

RBI's screening committee is expected to meet again this month and hand over the list of qualifying candidates to an external committee headed by Bimal Jalan, a former RBI governor . Jalan had said that the committee would be able to come out with its recommendations in three months. Earlier this month, the Tata group withdrew from the race for a bank licence after they found the process of restructuring operations too complex.

Sharma, who took charge last month, was earlier executive director in charge of equity research at LIC. She was appointed CEO of the housing finance company following her predecessor V K Sharma's elevation as MD of LIC.


Source: Economic Times

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IOB to open 400 more branches this fiscal

Indian Overseas Bank is opening branches in Bangkok and Dubai. The bank Chairman and Managing Director M. Narendra told reporters here on Friday that the bank was in an expansion mode and had set itself the target of opening 400 more branches during the current financial year. At present, the bank has 3,059 branches.

Financial inclusion

“Our focus is on opening more rural branches and taking banking to villages. We have covered 3,000 villages under the financial inclusion scheme. There is a lot to be done on that count. Till now all the banks put together have covered only half of the six lakh villages in the country and there is a huge challenge and an opportunity ahead,” he said. He said the bank’s business — currently at Rs 3,89,000 crore — would cross the Rs 4 lakh-crore mark by the end of the current financial year, “but we have set ourselves a stiff target of Rs 4,25,000 crore.” He said the economic downturn was affecting the performance of banks, and inflation was also a cause for worry.

Narendra said the bank had recently recruited 4,562 employees and 6,500 more would be recruited depending on the expansion plans.

In Andhra Pradesh, the bank has 240 branches and 30 more would be added during the current financial year. “Our expansion will go on at the same pace during 2014-15, and we will add 500 branches all over the country, 50 of them in Andhra Pradesh,” he said.

The gross NPA of the bank stands at 4.65 per cent and net NPA at 2.83 per cent. “We want to bring down the gross NPA to below 3 per cent,” he added.

sarma.rs@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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RBI on course to issue new bank licences, says Rajan

The Reserve Bank of India will start issuing new banking licences from early next year.

RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan said the apex bank is ‘primarily on course’ to hand over the licences. “We are largely in line with our target date, may be a few weeks this way or that way. We hope to start handing out the licences by early next year,” Rajan told reporters here.

He, however, did not peg on the number of licences that would be handed out. The decision to issue licences would be taken by a committee. “That will be based on what the committee recommends and what the RBI decides. We don’t have a fixed number in mind,” Rajan said.

A total of 26 companies have applied for licences.

Foreign Banks

According to Rajan, foreign banks operating in the country are neither keen on expanding their branches nor are they looking for the wholly owned subsidiary model, proposed by the central bank.

“It is interesting. One section thinks that we have given away too much to the foreign banks and therefore they are protesting against the (wholly owned subsidiary) model. But the foreign banks themselves don’t seem to be interested,” he said.

The wholly owned subsidiary model, he pointed out, is important from the perspective of stability in the banking system. “There are benefits to it (subsidiary model) that foreign banks will see as they study it over (a period of) time. One of the benefits is that they can expand a little more, but they don’t seem to be interested,” he said.

The wholly owned subsidiary model would also help the foreign banks preserve capital.

Increased Liquidity

According to Rajan, as far as government bond yields are concerned, the RBI would look at keeping liquidity in markets. It would look to maintain liquidity at a certain level.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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RBI offers borrowing under MSF on Saturday

In anticipation of liquidity tightening due to outflows on account of advance tax, the Reserve Bank of India has decided to extend borrowing facility under the MSF window on Saturday.

“As the liquidity conditions are expected to tighten on account of advance tax payments commencing from mid-December 2013, Reserve Bank has decided to offer funds to the Banks for two days through Marginal Standing Facility (MSF) on Saturday,” RBI said in a statement.

The MSF window will remain open between 5.00 p.m. and 5.30 p.m. and the due date of repayment will be December 16, 2013 (Monday), the statement said.

Currently, the MSF rate is at 8.75 per cent.

On December 11, banks had borrowed Rs 250 crore through the MSF window, while a day later on December 12, the amount borrowed was limited to Rs 50 crore.

Earlier this week, RBI had had decided to provide additional liquidity of Rs 10,000 crore through the 14-day term repo on Friday. In the auction, the RBI notified allotted Rs 48,506 crore from bids amounting to Rs 76,625 crore. The cut off rate was 8.01 per cent.

beena.parmar@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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C.V.R. Rajendran appointed CMD of Andhra Bank

After being headless for more than three months, Andhra Bank has a new Chairman and Managing Director in C.V.R. Rajendran.

Prior to this elevation, Rajendran was executive director at Bank of Maharashtra.

Rajendran will be Chairman and Managing Director of Andhra Bank for a period of five years or until superannuation, whichever is earlier. He is due to superannuate in April 2015.

srivats.kr@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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DHFL Vysya Housing eyes 30% growth in disbursements

DHFL Vysya Housing Finance Ltd (DVHF) is confident of achieving at least a 30 per cent increase in home loan disbursements this fiscal, its Managing Director R. Nambirajan has said.

The company is targeting a disbursement level of about Rs 400 crore in the current fiscal, he told Business Line.

Last year, the housing finance company, which is part owned by Dewan Housing Finance, had disbursed Rs 272 crore, recording a near 35 per cent jump on a year-on-year basis.

Strong demand

Nambirajan said that there was strong demand for housing loans among the middle class and lower middle class, especially in tier-3 cities.

He ruled out any capital raising this fiscal, stating that the company had comfortable capital adequacy ratio of 18 per cent.

srivats.kr@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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Banks may soon begin charging customers for ATM usage

Free withdrawals at ATMs may soon become a thing of the past. To make good the expenses incurred on beefing up security, banks are considering levying a charge on all ATM transactions, be it a cash withdrawal or a balance enquiry.

With the police in various States insisting that ATM kiosks have security guards 24x7, CCTV cameras inside and outside the kiosks, and video footage to be preserved for at least six months, bankers say the costs will more than double.

The security concerns have been triggered by the recent lethal attack on a woman customer in an ATM booth in Bangalore. Most of the over 1,00,000 ATMs in the country neither have round-the-clock guards nor surveillance cameras.

Currently, all transactions by customers at their bank’s ATMs are free. The first five transactions in a month at other ATMs are also free.

“Hiring trained guards for three eight-hour shifts, procuring arms licences, installing cameras inside and outside the ATM and connecting alarms to the nearest police station will have huge cost implications for banks,” said a senior public sector bank official.

Discussions on fee

Banks are now in discussions with the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) to arrive at the fee to be levied and the modalities relating to enhancement of security.

Further, to cut costs, they are also considering the feasibility of having operational hours, say from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., for some ATMs, which either do not have footfalls at night or are in locations that are sparsely populated.

“We are all working on the modalities through the IBA. There are issues, such as competition and ATM spread, which have to be taken into consideration before arriving at a decision,” R.R. Sharma, Chief General Manager, Canara Bank, told Business Line on Wednesday.

According to initial estimates, the cost per transaction works out to Rs 6 on the basis of an average of 200 transactions in each of the 100,000-plus ATMs across the country, Sharma said. However, the individual cost structures for banks might wary.

“But definitely, it will be a significant cost for banks, which can impact profitability. Every branch should have an ATM and there are some ATMs that are not frequented by many customers. Providing security at these would be expensive,” said M. Anjaneya Prasad, Executive Director, Syndicate Bank.

BIG BURDEN

Banks are worried. If the 100,000 ATMs have 20 million transactions a day that means 600 million transactions a month.

So, if each transaction costs Rs 6, the total expenditure for banks would be Rs 360 crore a month. If the proposal goes through, this cost would have to be borne by customers.

Imposition of any fee would mean the end of free ATM usage for customers. “Already we just have five free transactions in ATMs of other banks. While this itself is not justified, how can we be made to pay for security at ATMs?” questioned H. Phaneedra, a customer.

Bankers are, however, hoping that the Reserve Bank of India will give its nod to levy charges on ATMs transactions.

naga.gunturi@thehindu.co.in

ramkumar.k@thehindu.co.in

Source: thehindubusinessline

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IRDA: HIV/AIDS patients to pay higher insurance premium

Persons suffering from HIV/AIDS or other pre-existing illness will have to pay higher premium for life insurance, regulator IRDA said.

Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) Chairman T. S. Vijayan said insurance companies will provide life cover to persons with pre-existing illness, but the pricing will be based on commercial considerations.

“The whole idea is the person may be having a disease, once the policy has started even if the person is having disease, he is not excluded. Obvious thing is pricing has to be different. That is the commercial decision left to the industry,” he told presspersons after a FICCI event here.

He said a few insurers have already introduced cover for HIV/AIDS infected patients. “I am sure more companies will bring policies,” Vijayan said.

The IRDA had in October come out with a draft circular asking all insurers to provide life insurance cover to HIV/AIDS patients.

The circular on policies for people with HIV/AIDS is likely come into effect from April 2014 and insurers would be required to put in place procedures for underwriting and claim settlement, and proposal form before that.

The circular also provides for health insurance products offered by life insurers for those who are HIV negative at inception of the policy and acquire HIV/AIDS after commencement of insurance policy.

With respect to such persons who are HIV negative at the commencement of the contract and subsequently found to be HIV positive during the term of the policy, the circular states that the insurers should not reject/deny any claim on such grounds and in all such cases, the underwriting guidelines and claims settlement guidelines applicable at the time of commencement should be applicable.

Source: thehindubusinessline

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