Pensioners’ hope for better service

The priority for common middle-class pensioners is to get adequate returns on their bank deposits. Many of them also hope for hassle-free service at the counter. Of course, the payment of pension to their accounts on the due date will still top their agenda.

Many a time when they reach the bank branch, either the printer in the branch is out-of-order to update their passbooks or the computer hangs, for reasons not known to anyone at the branch level.

And they are asked to come to the bank at a later date for updating their passbook.

Many of the pensioners expressed such grouses at a ‘town hall’ meet organised by the Karnataka Banking Ombudsman in Mangalore recently.

The delay in crediting pension amount to the accounts also irked them. One of the pensioners said that most branches in the city credit the pension amount by 30th of the month. However, some branches took five more days to credit the amount.

Yet another pensioner was heard saying that banks should look beyond offering 1 per cent extra interest to the pensioners’ deposits, and focus on other finer points also.

The situation outside the banks is no different.

One of the pensioners wanted to know if the chocolate is a substitute for small denomination coins and currency notes.

According to him, even the senior citizens are offered chocolates when the shopkeeper does not have the adequate coins or currency notes of small denominations.

“This is not the age for us to eat chocolates,” was how that person expressed his grouse on the scarcity of coins.

vinayak.aj@thehindu.co.in