SBI imposes fee od Rs 100 for making credit card payments through cheques: All you need to know

The State Bank of India is levying a charge on cheque payments made to pay credit card bills. This was implemented from April 1.

However, SBI Card has stated that payments made below Rs 2,000 through cheques will attract a fee of Rs 100.

On its website, SBI said, "A fee of Rs.100 will be charged for payments made by cheque for an amount less than or equal to Rs 2000 w.e.f. 1st April 2017. No additional fee will be charged for cheque payments greater than Rs 2000.

The bank has defended the move.

Quoting SBI Card MD and CEO Vijay Jasuja, a report in TOI said, "A large number of cheques were being dropped late into the boxes and subsequently disputes were raised on late payment charges. We have done a deep analysis. It is not possible that every month the bank is making a mistake in cheque collection".

However, payments made through SBI cheques will not incur the extra charge.  

Meanwhile, SBI is planning to raise customer base of its wealth management service targeting Huns (high net worth individuals) under SBI Exclusif to 35,000 by year end from the present 3,500.

The country's largest commercial bank started the service in January last year and has nine exclusive physical centres across the country, SBIs Managing Director (National Banking) Rajnish Kumar said.

It plans to open four more such centres by the end of this year, he said.

"We feel that the country is growing and there are people of HNI category who want some special service and advisory services, therefore we decided to create a separate business vertical under wealth management unit," Kumar, who was here to inaugurate an SBI Exclusif centre in Ahmedabad, told reporters.

He said the bank employs 900 relationship managers under this segment and plans to double the number by the end of the year.

The segment provides services to individuals with monthly salary of Rs 2 lakh and above, having housing loans of Rs 1 crore or more, or Rs 3 lakh in asset management, among others, he said.