Mumbai: In a unique initiative, the All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA) has launched a 'Bank Clinic' with a purpose to assist customers, impart knowledge and address grievances.
Currently, 139 commercial banks handle 300 crore deposit accounts and 40 crore loan accounts through 1,56,951 branches in the country.
AIBEA Joint Secretary Devidas Tuljapurkar, who is also Maharashtra State Bank Employees Federation’s General Secretary, said that making bank customers financially literate and aware regarding today's technology has become of the utmost importance.
“Various initiatives have been taken by banks, but to bridge the gap between its need and availability, a free service for bank customers has been launched by AIBEA, the oldest and largest association of bank employees in the country. It aims to provide information, guidance and advice to bank customers,” he said.
According to Tuljapurkar, 98.5 per cent of the 300 crore deposit accounts have a balance of less than Rs 5 lakhs.
30 crore loan account holders of the 40 crore loan accounts are borrowers up to Rs 2 lakh. 52.50 crore accounts in deposit accounts have been opened under Jan Dhan Yojana, which has 2.30 lakh crore deposits.
These banks have 1.26 lakh ATMs connected to the branch and 97826 ATMs away from the branch, besides 17.36 lakh micro ATMs.
The banks have distributed 96.94 crore debit cards, 10.25 crore credit cards to their account holders. Apart from this 20 lakh as Bank Mitras are providing banking services to customers, while 88.38 lakhs Point of Sales, 60.59 lakhs Bharat QR Code, 31.95 crore UPI QR Code are doing online payment transactions.
“Due to this in the last ten for years, there has been an explosion in the number of bank accounts and the banking transactions. This has made it very convenient for bank customers to transact anywhere and anytime.
Lack of financial literacy, technological information and knowledge has made transactions very complicated for the common man. As a result bank customers have suffered a loss of Rs. 4.69 lakh crore in the nine years from January 1, 2014 to March 31, 2023,” he said.