Bangladesh Bank is going to impose charge on clients of all banks for inter-bank money transactions through cheques and electronic fund transfer for the first time.
Sources in the banking circle and clients said such move of the central bank would create extra burden for the clients. A BB official told New Age on Wednesday that the central bank had already set the cheque transaction rate which would be effective after issuing a BB circular.
He said the BB had earlier formed a committee of seven members from commercial banks to set the charge on November 15, 2011.
On September 13, the committee presented its proposals at a meeting presided over by BB executive officer Dasgupta Asim Kumar at the central bank headquarters in the capital.
According to the recommendations, the clients would count Tk 50 for clearing of each high value cheque, Tk 12 for regular value cheque and Tk 10 for each electronic fund transfer.
The central bank would receive Tk 25 and Tk 8 and Tk 5 from each transaction of high and regular value cheque and electronic fund transfer to manage its operational cost of Bangladesh Automated Clearing House, the official said.
The commercial banks will receive the rest of amount of the charges, he said.
‘The clients will not have to count any charge if they draw money from their own accounts through cheques. But they will be charged when they issue cheques like cross cheques for submitting to other banks or engage in bank transaction through electronic means,’ said the BB official.
Tk 5 lakh and above is considered as high value cheque and the banks have to transact the cheque at 3pm in a working day.
Any figure of taka is considered regular value cheque and the banks have to transact the cheque at 5pm in a working day.
The banks have to conduct the EFT transaction from one account to another account within 12am.
He said the BB had taken a measure to bring all the districts under the automated clearing house in December 12, 2012.
Another BB official admitted the new charge for cheque transaction would make an extra burden on the clients.
He said, ‘The commercial banks were conducting the three kinds of transaction through BACH of the BB. For this reason, the central bank said in its logic that it would manage operating cost by imposing the charge for cheque transactions.’
He said the BB had launched the automated clearing house on October 7, 2010 shifting from the manual clearing house financed by a donor organisation of the United Kingdom.
He said the central bank did not plunge into a losing situation after establishing the BACH, rather it gained Tk 7,031.74 crore as net operating profit from its budgetary target of Tk 3,154.51 crore in financial year 2011-12.
Saiful Islam, an official of a non-government organisation, said that the commercial banks already took various kinds of service charges from the clients.
Moreover, the recommended charge rate for cheque transaction is too high and it would only help the commercial banks to earn more illogical profit from the clients, he said.
-With New Age input