The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) recently permitted banks in India to increase customer charges for cash and non-cash ATM transactions which are done after the monthly free transactions limit has been reached.
Banks can now charge Rs 21, instead of Rs 20 per transaction, from customers after they exceed the monthly free transactions limit. The new charges will come into effect from January 1, 2022 and will apply on all financial and non-financial transactions.
Furthermore, banks can now increase the interchange fee per transaction. For financial transactions, the new charge will be Rs 17 compared to Rs 15 earlier. he fee for non-financial transactions will increase by a rupee from Rs 5 to Rs 6. This will come into effect from August 1, 2021.
Nevertheless, some private banks will still be offering their customers the privilege of unlimited free ATM transactions.
Banks offering unlimited free ATM transactions
Three private banks, IndusInd Bank, Citibank and IDBI Bank, offer unlimited free transactions to their customers.
Jorty Chacko, Executive Director of IDBI Bank told a leading media house, “IDBI Bank offers free ATM transactions in consonance with the RBI Prescribed minimum free limits. Accordingly, the Bank offers 5 free transactions at its own ATMs. In other Bank ATMs, the Bank offers 3 transactions free at 6 metro locations and 5 transactions free at other locations. The Bank however offers unlimited free ATM transactions in few select product variants as per the product design.”
As per IndusInd Bank website, the bank offers unlimited free ATM withdrawals with the IndusInd Bank debit card across any ATM in India. Likewise, Citibank still offers unlimited free transactions, as per the BankBazaar website.
On the other hand, State Bank of India (SBI) customers maintaining an average savings account balance of over Rs 25,000 can do unlimited transactions at any of the State Bank Group ATMs. For customers with average savings account balance upwards of Rs 1 lakh are eligible for unlimited transactions not just at State Bank Group ATMs but also ATMs of other banks.
