The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Monday released its annual report of Ombudsman Schemes 2019-20. The RBI closely monitors the banks, NBFCs and the new age digital players. There are some interesting facts around the 3.50 lakh complaints that the RBI received during the year 2019-20.
Chandigarh received the highest banking-related complaints at 31,594 in 2019-20, a rise of 141 per cent over the previous year. In fact, Chandigarh office has the highest 10 per cent share in country-wise complaints. Bhopal office saw the second highest growth at 137 per rise of complaints to 14,510.
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The share of complaints from the metro regions has gone up big time from 26 per cent three years ago to 50 per cent in 2019-20, whereas it has declined in urban areas from 50 per cent in 2017-18 to 22 per cent in 2019-20.
The per complaint cost was highest in Jammu at Rs 8,088 per complaint in 2019-20. Kolkata office followed closely with 5,438 per complaint cost. But the overall average cost of handling complaints declined from Rs 3,145 in 2018-19 to Rs 2,412 in 2019-20.
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In three years time, the mode of complaint has drastically shifted from post, fax, courier and hand delivery to online mode. The traditional paper mode had a share of 36 per cent in 2017-18, which had reduced to 14 per cent. In fact, the online mode had taken a lead over e-mail as well as traditional mode. Over 50 per cent of the complaints came via online mode. This online mode witnessed a growth of 247 per cent in 2019-20.
The complaints related to ATM, debit card, mobile and electronic banking were the major grounds for complaints during the year.
The number of complaints pertaining to direct sales agent and recovery agents increased from 629 complaints in 2018-19 to 1,406 complaints this year.
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