Reserve Bank of India issues circular to alert customers with regards to cheques
Posted on: 06/Nov/2014 4:28:54 PM
Reserve Bank of India has issued circular to banks all over the country to put a check on the increasing fraud cases and to have their account holders to be alerted by phone calls. Moreover, the banks are also to contact base branch, if non-home cheques are involved before high value payments are cleared. Banks are also asked to inform drawer/payer through SMS at the time of receiving cheques to be cleared and have them examined under UV lamp, if the amount is over Rs. 2 lakh. It was added further by the central bank that cheques more than Rs. 5 lakh needs to undergo multi-level checking.
There is an urgent need to use all types of preventative measures while dealing with big value cheques or those that are suspicious, said RBI to the banks through the communication sent.
Due the increase in the number of frauds related to cheques, RBI was prompted to issue this direction. There are also instances where the account holder had possession of the original cheque, but still cheques of the same series were discovered to be presented to the bank and also enchased by the fraudsters. Banks are given the freedom to selectively choose the direction given by RBI, since implementing them systematically might not be feasible.
