COVID-19: SBP announces doorstep cheque collection, other facilities

KARACHI: State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Thursday announced various facilities for banking customers in the wake of coronavirus pandemic including doorstep and drop box cheque collection facilities, ARY NEWS reported.

A circular issued from the state bank announced the measures aimed at limiting person-to-person interactions and providing ease of services.

Announcing facilitation under the direct cheque facility amid coronavirus pandemic, it said that a crossed cheque may be presented by payee/beneficiary directly into the paying/drawee bank, instead of their bank branches as per the existing practice.

In this case, funds may be transferred by the paying/drawee bank either through RTGS customer fund transfer – MT102 or Over the Counter (OTC) IBFT or Bank’s internal online system.

The circular also asked the banks to make arrangements for collecting cheque from registered addresses of their customers upon their request while the customers may drop their cheques in drop boxes of their banks, installed in selected branches.

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According to further details, the clearance of cheques will also be made within minutes under new directives and the customer could receive cheque payments within minutes.

Divulging the procedure, the SBP said that banks may allow their customers to send them the scanned image of the cheque along with relevant details of the beneficiary either through registered emails or through mobile apps of their banks to push funds from their accounts to the payee bank.

Further, to minimize person-to-person interaction, banks may also make arrangements with the Clearing House (NIFT) for clearing their cheques through Image Based Clearing (IBC) functionality as per the agreed SOPs between NIFT and banks.