State Bank of India (SBI) has relinquished service charge for non-maintenance of minimum balance stipulations with respect to savings accounts. This major step of bank is a move forward towards customer retention and acquisition.
The bank considers this waiver as a strong selling point for savings bank product because according to the bank , once a customer becomes a savings bank accountholder, he/ she can be induced to make use of other products, besides-cross selling of the products of subsidiaries. This move is also in line with Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) clarification of no compulsion on levy of any service charge on savings bank accounts without minimum balance.
Further, to the comfort, the bank’s branches would not have to manually intervene as CBS will take care of waiver of charges automatically. Branches will however have to ensure that while opening a savings bank account, a minimum of Rs 100 is to be deposited, except in the case of ‘No Frills Account', where the minimum deposit is Rs 50.
