No exchange of notes for other-bank customers; senior citizens exempted

Banks tomorrow will not exchange the old Rs 500 or 1000 notes for new bills, allowing only senior citizens to make the one-time swap for upto Rs 2000. On Sunday, banks will remain shut.

Indian Banks’ Association on Friday said that all banks will serve only their respective customers tomorrow and will not exchange the old Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes from customers of other banks.

“All these days our own customers have suffered because we have not been able to do their work. So, we have seen lot of pending work at branches especially for our existing customers. We, from IBA, have taken a view that tomorrow, that is, on Saturday, we shall be exclusively doing work for our own customers. And tomorrow we will not be doing exchange of notes (for outside customers),” IBA chairman Rajeev Rishi said.

He, however, said senior citizens are exempted and they can go to any bank branch to exchange notes tomorrow.

Since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s sudden announcement last week outlawing high-denomination notes, banks have been overflowing with customers desperate to get cash. The bills that were cancelled form 86 per cent of the money in circulation.

Sources in the Finance Ministry today denied that there is a discussion on whether to end the offer of providing new notes for old ones. The cap was originally set at Rs 4000; it was raised at the start of the week to Rs 4500 only to be reduced yesterday to Rs 2000.

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