Friday, March 15, 2013

TIPS FOR SAFE BANKING


Recently banking industry have came across with numerous fraud incidents , in which fraudsters misused a little ignorance of genuine account holders and either siphoned off their hard earned money or used their accounts to create maze of fraud transactions

Some simple tips to prevent customers for becoming target of fraudsters

1.              Do not sign any blank document.

2.             Do not share your passwords of ATM or Internet Banking with any one including your bank and its employees.

3.              Whenever you change your address or contact numbers, instruct your bank to update the same.

4.                   Do not keep inactive accounts i.e. if you are not using any account then close that account.

5.                   Do not maintain more than one savings / checking / regular account in one bank and keep all your accounts in one branch for proper monitoring of account.

6.                   For State Bank customers, try keeping all your account under single CIF (CIF means customer identification number).

7.                   If you are holding NRI /PIO/OCI Status, then don not keep any resident account

8.                   NRO accounts are meant for basically receiving of Indian income payable to NRI, so if you are not having any such incomes then close your NRO account.

9.                   Always provide PAN in NRO account , so that TDS can be deposited in your PAN

10.               Banks are offering various channels for account operations , so do not give Power of Attorney until it is necessary , all unused POA should be withdrawn by intimating bank

11.               Do not leave your signed blank cheques.

12.               Any lost cheque should immediately be reported to bank for stop payment.

13.               Do not keep large sums in your savings / checking/ regular accounts, keep your excess funds in Fixed Deposits.

14.               Check your account statement or passbook at regular intervals preferably once in a month.

15.               Always communicate with official email id of Bank Branch, do not respond to personal email id of bank employee, official branch email id is available at bank website (in state bank, all the branches were assigned their unique email id v.i.z sbi.xxxxx@sbi.co.in , here ‘xxxxx’ is 5 digit branch code, for e.g. our branch code is 15194 so official email id of this branch will be sbi.15194@sbi.co.in ).

16.               Do not act or reply to those emails where recipient id is mentioned as "undisclosed recipient" or your id is in ‘cc’.

17.               Always use official website of banks for referring rules & regulation of the Bank and product.

18.               Customer and Banks both are responsible to follow rules & regulation drawn by apex bodies as RBI, FEMA, CBDT, FM, IT etc, so refer their official websites before doing any uncommon transaction through banks.

19.               Do not take decisions on verbal suggestions of bank employees always take all the advises in writing with clear meaning.

20.               Pay more attention while investing in other than regular bank products and read its terms and conditions carefully.

21.               Freebees offered by any bank or its employees should be crossed checked at official bank website

22.               While remitting funds from any financial institution from abroad, please verify whether remitting institution is able to credit the same in your NRE Account or not.