SBI- Careless Bank & Pathetic service . Review on State Bank Of India

This review is based on my personal experience with SBI - probably it will change your view point & open your eyes how this bank is su*king its customers , They are very prompt in debiting the amount from your account , be it ATM charges, cheque/dd charges or any other services eg. DMAT account charges etc.... But when it comes their turn to credit some amount into your account they really make you cry. This is my experience with this bank , I have my account with this bank since last 18 years just because of the compulsion that our salary is directly credited to our SBI accounts.  There service is so pathetic that you will have to waste hrs together from your precious time in getting your passbook updated,  they will always say that the computer/printer is not working and make this and that excuse. If you want a new cheque book , they  will make you come again and again just for getting the new cheque book issued. They will keep on making the excuses that the cheque book is not available, or computer is not working etc.etc. Anyway these were certain issues which were kept on accumulating and I wanted to write a review on this bank. Although I thought these were small issues which could have been ignored , But the main issue comes now.READ IT THROUGH:Though its relatively long . please bear with me.

Myself  &  4 of my subordinate employees applied for getting a plot of diffrent sizes in HUDA's scheme at Panipat which was published in Feb'06. But unfortunateny no one was lucky to get one. Total amount involved was about Rs. 5.5 lacs. Thereafter HUDA send our refund cheques after closing of the scheme after six months of its commencement. We received our refund orders in Sep'2006 subsequently we deposited the refund cheques to our SBI branch on 25/10/2006. These cheques were issued on ICICI bank, The nearest ICICI bank branch is in BHOPAL threfore the cheques were to be sent to icici bhopal for realization.

We all were certain that the amount of the cheques will be credited to our respective accounts within a period of about 20 days. But to our surprise, no amount was credited even after one month from the date of depositing the cheques. In the meantime we had enquired from the bank about our cheques, however we got assurance that our amount will be credited shortly. Finally one fine day on 15/12/2006 after lapsing over 45 days, I once again enquired from the bank about our cheques,  There it was told to me that the bus/vehicle carrying our cheques met with an accident and the bunch which contained our cheques have been stolen/missed. We all got very upset and immidiately approached the bank manager to get clear picture, he very casually told us that its true that all of our cheques were stolen/missing. We also came to know that the bank is sending the cheques of huge amount through local courier in order to save the money which will otherwise be spent on registered/insured posts.

The bank even didnt lodge a FIR or tried out to find out our missing cheques. The bank Manager shown his inability to do anything as the cheques were missed by the third party, "the so called courier".

In the meantime we also came across some of the guidelines issued by Reserve Bank of India in its" Master Circular on Customer services". I thought these guidelines will be useful to all of us who deals with these public/private banks directly or indirectly. Here goes the abstract of guidelines which is taken from "Master circular on Customer services" issued by RBI , (available at https://rbi.org.in)

3  Immediate Credit of Local/Outstation Cheques:

3.1. Local/ Outstation Cheques upto Rs. 5, 000:

All primary (urban) co-operative banks should afford immediate credit for all outstation cheques upto the value of Rs. 5, 000 tendered by individual account holders, provided they are satisfied about proper conduct of the accounts. These arrangements should be scrupulously followed. The banks may recover usual collection charges in respect of outstation cheques. The banks should not wait for customers' requests for the facility but should, as a matter of normal course, provide this

service. However, in respect of local cheques, the banks may extend the facility of affording immediate credit upto Rs. 5, 000 to customers who wish to avail of the facility and are prepared to bear charges for the same.

3.5 Payment of Interest for Delay in collection of Outstation Cheques / Instruments :

3.5.1 In all cases of delay in collection of outstation cheques and other instruments, the banks are required to pay interest at saving bank rate for delayed collection of outstation cheques/instruments

drawn either on their own outstation branches or on outstation branches of other (drawee) banks and sent for collection, if the proceeds are not realised/credited to the customers' accounts or the

unpaid instruments are not returned to customers within a period of 14 days from the date of their lodgement.

3.5.2 If the delay in collection of outstation cheques/instruments is beyond 10 days in the case of cheques lodged at and drawn on State Head Quarters except the State Capitals of North Eastern Region and Sikkim and beyond 14 days in all other cases, banks should pay interest at rate as applicable for appropriate tenure of fixed deposit for the period of delay. Further, banks should also pay penal interest at the rate of 2 per cent above fixed deposit rate for abnormal delay caused by the branch in collection of outstation instruments.

3.5.3 Interest payable should be paid/ credited to all types of accounts of the customers without the customers having to claim it. Such interest may, however, be paid only when the amount is

Rs. 5 or more.

*So this was the abstract taken from RBI guidelines hope this will be beneficial to everybody who deals with banks. (please visit https://rbi.org.in if you want more details)

MS does not allow >7500 chars and also it doesnt allow two reviews for the same product/service by one user. therefore I need to cut short and conclude my review within next few lines.............

In the meantime we kept on following the bank manager but to no avail. Finally we decided to contact HUDA panipat and pursue our case directly since we were missing the opportunity to invest this huge amount and get some return. We had to send our representative with authorization for collecting our duplicate cheques from HUDA on our behalf. There was no help extended by the SBI. There attitude was also negative. In the end on 23/03/2007 (after about 5 months) we could get the duplicate cheques issued and amount was credited to our resp.accounts. As per RBI guidelines clause 3.5.2, by default bank has to pay the intrest amount @5% which comes to about Rs 2042/person for 5 months for unwanted  delay which was due to bank's carelessness, hence it has to be borne by the bank. But as yet no intrest has been paid and we are still following up the issue with bank.

MS will not allow me anymore to write as 7500 char limit is exhausting. Finally I would say that SBI really sucks, Beware of this careless and pathetic service bank.

Please rate my review & drop a line of comment too. Thank you all for reading this.

thanks.