The Reserve Bank of India has set-up a working group to review and make improvements in the grievance redress mechanism for bank customers. “A Working Group has been constituted in the Reserve Bank of India to review, update, and revise the Banking Ombudsman Scheme, 2006,” the central bank said in a statement.
In financial year 2011-12, the banking ombudsman’s office of the RBI received 72,889 complaints (up from 71,274 complaints in the year before). It disposed off 94 per cent of the customer complaints in the same year, RBI said in its annual report of the Banking Ombudsman Scheme 2011-12.
About one-fourth of the total customer complaints were about banks’ failure to meet commitments and non-observance of fair practices code.
The Banking Ombudsman received 14,492 card related complaints in the reporting year.
Unsolicited cards, charging of annual fee in spite of being offered ‘free’ card formed the basis of some of the complaints against the banks.
Interestingly, last month, the central bank ordered banks to stop dispatching a card to the customer unless solicited.
Presently, there are fifteen Banking Ombudsmen with specific jurisdiction covering the 29 States and seven Union Territories in India.