IFSC of SBI associates may change from Q2

The Indian Financial System Code, or IFSC, of all associate banks that merged with State Bank of India (SBI) are likely to change from the second quarter of 2017-18.

For now though, the IFSCs will remain as they are, a ready reckoner from the SBI Group Technology Department, Mumbai, said.

Post-merger, there will no change in the way a corporate internet banking customer of an associate bank would log into its existing account.

The corporate can directly log into OnlineSBI.com with the existing credentials of its associate bank (SBH, SBT, SBM, SBP, and SBBJ).

This would mean that despite the websites of the associate banks getting disabled from April 1, the internet banking facility for corporates will continue.

Anyone logging into the existing account in the associate bank will get re-directed to the SBI site. It is absolutely safe to log in with the credentials of the existing account with the associate bank.

There will be nochange in the ‘regulator role’ for a corporate account with the associate bank, and it can continue with activities, including creating profiles, setting limits, and managing users as before.

As a regulator, the account holder will be able to get the same reports in the same format. Only the branding of the reports will be of SBI.

A corporate internet banking customer who wants to transfer funds to accounts in the former associate bank may treat the latter as ‘other bank’ beneficiaries (and not ‘same bank’ beneficiaries).

Those account-holders of associate banks which have issued pre-paid cards to their employees need not worry since these cards will continue to work, and can also be topped up online.

A corporate Net banking customer cannot request for demand drafts (DDs) to be issued on any branch of the associate bank till further notice. Instead, online request for draft issuance may be made on branches of the home bank only (in this case SBI).

There will no change in the supplier payment module to make payments to customers. The merger will not change the way the module is currently being used.

As for tax payments, after completing the formalities on the tax site, when asked to select the bank for online payment, the erstwhile associate bank may be selected.

The customer will then be redirected to the SBI site where the existing user id/password may be keyed in to complete the transaction.

When the remitter’s bank clicks on the State Bank Collect link on the homepage for payment, they will get a page drop-down list of associate banks. The customer would then select the erstwhile associate bank in the drop-down from where he/she would get redirected to the payment page.