Financial fraud: 26 get refund courtesy Ombudsman

     

 

Source :Express News Service:: Thu Nov 10 2011, 00:51 hrs

Chandigarh:

In the spate of cases of fraudulent ATM transactions and card cloning last year, most of the aggrieved clients in the tricity have got a full refund of their money by the respective bank, courtesy the Banking Ombudsman of the Reserve Bank of India.

Ombudsman (RBI Central Office Chandigarh) J Tashi, on Wednesday, said that in 26 cases, the banks had been directed to give the clients full refund of their money. He said that he is now processing cases of ATM frauds at Ambala, where the orders have been given in favour of the aggrieved clients.

The Ombudsman scheme has been in operation for four years at the Central Office in Chandigarh, covering UT, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, and three districts of Haryana - Panchkula, Yamunanagar and Ambala.

 During this period, almost 100 per cent of the complaints each year were resolved by the Ombudsman by facilitating a mutual settlement between the bank and the aggrieved customer.

Statistics reveal that senior citizens are increasingly making the best use of the grievance redressal system of the Banking Ombudsman. 

The highest complaints received by the Ombudsman for north India pertain to pension disputes.

From 2009-10 to 2010-11 (Ending June 30 2011), there has been a whopping 82 per cent rise in cases filed by retired persons regarding pension disputes against banks. 

Most of these complaints regarding payment of pension in a time-bound manner, and for expeditious release of amounts in the deceased depositors' accounts for use of spouse. During the same period, there has been an increase of 35 per cent in complaints pertaining to deposits.

Most complaints to the Ombudsman about 'Deposits' pertain to refund of wrongly-deducted TDS (tax deduction at source), payment of interest on overdue deposits, refund of charges deducted without notice, fraudulently transferred amount because of poor internal controls in net banking, and fraudulent encashment of pilfered cheques.

Regarding credit cards, the Ombudsman has settled several cases regarding settlement of old dues, charges levied without notice, furnishing of 'No Dues Certificate' and rectification of wrong entry in CIBIL (Credit Information Bureau of India Ltd) records. 

The Ombudsman said that there are now several cases in which the name of clients is wrongly entered in the defaulters' list of CIBIL. As a result, these clients cannot avail loans or get new credit cards.

The low penetration of the complete network of banking services in Himachal Pradesh and lack of awareness among clients is evident from the fact that only 6.7 complaints received last year were from Himachal Pradesh.