NRB asks BFIs not to charge for ECC

KATHMANDU, APR 03: 

The central bank has directed the banks and financial institutions (BFIs) not to charge while clearing cheque electronically.

Nepal Clearing House is operating full fledged from next Monday since it started its operations from February 8 with foreign currency cheques clearing.

According to the current structure, it will cost Rs 10 per cheque to settle an amount above Rs 5,000 and Rs 5 for a cheque to settle up to Rs 5,000 as transaction cost. “But the banks and finance companies cannot charge the clients for clearing the cheques electronically,” according to Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB).

Currently, the clearing house has 36 member banks and financial institutions that can clear the cheques electronically from Monday. Of the total 32 commercial banks, 30 have become members and two are yet to be the member of the clearing house for electronic cheque clearing.

But the central bank, for the time being, has kept the current manual system also in operation, as most of the development banks and finance companies are yet to participate at the electronic cheque clearing.

Currently, the clearing house is clearing around 150 to 200 cheques electronically in an average daily but after the full-fledged operations from Monday it is estimated to clear around 8,000 cheques daily, said chief executive of the clearing house Neelesh Pradhan.

The clearing house that has come into operations after repeated postponements is estimated to clear around 35,000 cheques daily electronically, he added. 

There will be two session for two types of cheques standard cheques and non-standard cheques, Pradhan said, adding that non-standard cheques are the cheques which are in circulation currently and standard cheques are the new standard format cheques which have necessary security features embedded and are coded with Magnetic Ink Character Reader.

All the member banks and financial institutions will soon migrate to the standard cheques to maximise the benefit of the electronic cheque.

The BFIs can clear cheques from across the country too, if they have the scanner in their branches, Pradhan said.

Source: THT