Bank customers will have to pay Rs 21 per transaction, instead of Rs 20, with effect from January 1, 2022, if they exceed the monthly limit of free transactions.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Thursday permitted lenders to increase charges for cash and non-cash automated teller machine (ATM) transactions beyond the free monthly permissible limit from next year.
Bank customers will have to pay Rs 21 per transaction, instead of Rs 20, with effect from January 1, 2022, if they exceed the monthly limit of free transactions.
“To compensate the banks for the higher interchange fee and given the general escalation in costs, they are allowed to increase the customer charges to ₹21 per transaction. This increase shall be effective from January 1, 2022,” the RBI said in a statement.
RBI, however, said the customers will continue to be eligible for five free transactions (inclusive of financial and non-financial transactions) every month from their own bank ATMs. They would also be able to do three free transactions from other bank ATMs in metros and five in non-metro centres.
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The RBI had, in 2019, constituted a committee to review the entire system of ATM charges and fees with a particular focus on interchange structure for ATM transactions.
“The recommendations of the committee have been comprehensively examined. It is also observed that the last change in interchange fee structure for ATM transactions was in August 2012, while the charges payable by customers were last revised in August 2014. A substantial time has thus elapsed since these fees were last changed,” the statement said.
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