Complaints up on bank recovery

Even as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued guidelines on recovery of outstanding amounts of money from consumers, there has been a rise in complaints against forceful recovery of outstanding amounts especially by the private sector banks.

Even as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued guidelines on recovery of outstanding amounts of money from consumers, there has been a rise in complaints against forceful recovery of outstanding amounts especially by the private sector banks.

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The apex bank has already asked banks to advise their recovery agents to be trained appropriately to handle the situation with care. “Training of the recovery agents is key and in many cases the process has not been followed,” a government official said.

A senior executive of a private sector bank said that after the global financial meltdown, credit card issuers and banks have become aggressive in their collection process.

“Banks and credit card issuers have been following a strict regiment and from the bank standpoint it is justifiable to a large extent. Non payment of outstanding cannot be promoted as a culture,” a banking executive said.

According to government data, in 2009-10, about 120 complaints were received by the banking ombudsman offices regarding non compliance and non observance of RBI guidelines. The number of complaints were minuscule prior to that.