I/III. [“Six to seven billion new notes of Rs500 have been replaced so far. Around 10 billion new notes need to be printed to reach the pre-demonetisation levels. This is likely to take another 10 months,” the person added.]
http://www.livemint.com/Industry/9ZHLm3H3X0UZFSq4ysYe4L/ATMs-still-running-dry-withdrawals-drop-as-smaller-notes-in.html Last Modified: Tue, Apr 04 2017. 08 01 PM IST ATMs still running dry, cash withdrawals drop as smaller notes in short supply ATM withdrawals drop have fallen since, even though cash supply has improved, the availability of lower-denomination notes of Rs500 and Rs100 is insufficient Gopika Gopakumar ATM operators were expecting the situation to normalize after the recent assembly elections, but that has not happened. Photo: Pradeep Gaur/Mint Nearly three weeks after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) lifted cash-withdrawal limits imposed in the wake of demonetisation, ATMs continue to run dry in several locations. Even though cash supply has improved, the availability of lower-denomination notes of Rs500 and Rs100 is insufficient. According to the latest RBI data, currency in circulation had fallen to Rs13.12 trillion as of 24 March from Rs17.97 trillion on 4 November. But the pace of remonetisation has slowed down. “There has been a steep fall in currency production. Earlier, if the presses were printing 150 million pieces of all denominations a day, it has now fallen to 110 million pieces,” a senior bank official said, declining to be named. “Workers have gone back to their earlier schedule. They are no longer working on 12-hour shifts.” ATM operators were expecting the situation to normalize after the recent assembly elections, but that has not happened. According to CMS Info Systems Pvt. Ltd, the largest ATM operator, customers continue to withdraw a little more than what they actually need because of scarcity of currency notes. “Within the CMS network, we are seeing that approximately 85% of ATMs are being replenished on a daily basis. However, we are also loading around 30% less than what we used to per ATM, and seeing around 9-10% of ATMs remaining dry (over 10-day periods),” said CMS spokesperson Sandhya Menon. ATM operators point out that the paucity of Rs500 and Rs100 notes in ATMs have led to a drop in cash withdrawals. “Lower-denomination notes are still not available and therefore people are hesitant to withdraw higher-denomination notes,” said Ramaswamy Venkatachalam, managing director, India and South Asia, FIS, an ATM manufacturer. A State Bank of India report released on Monday also highlighted this trend. According to this report, cash withdrawals have been declining rapidly from a peak of Rs52,800 crore for the week ended 13 January to Rs32,500 crore for the week ended 24 March. “The decline in cash withdrawals is intriguing even as limits on withdrawals have been removed completely from 13 March. Historically, average withdrawals are generally higher in the first fortnight of a month because people tend to spend more in the first fortnight,” the report added. However, if cash withdrawals are indeed falling, then the recent RBI data should point to a surge in digital transactions. But data as of 26 March shows that transactions have fallen to 497.2 million from 684.66 million in February. It is, however, clear that the process of remonetisation is expected to take more time. The printing of new notes is expected to fall further in the coming days as the army deployed to help with printing is set to be withdrawn from the process, said the bank official cited earlier. ***“Six to seven billion new notes of Rs500 have been replaced so far. Around 10 billion new notes need to be printed to reach the pre-demonetisation levels. This is likely to take another 10 months,” the person added.*** [Emphasis added.] Gopika Gopakumar II/III. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bhopal/bhopal-cash-woes-return-as-more-atms-run-dry/articleshow/57998202.cms Cash woes return as more ATMs run dry TNN | Updated: Apr 4, 2017, 05.32 AM IST Bhopal: Pay-day joy soon turned distressing for many on Monday. Most of the ATMs across the city ran dry leaving many gasping for cash. After the March-end closure and week-end holiday, the banks reopened Monday morning making it the pay-day for many. However, most of the ATMs continued to display the 'no cash' boards leaving people dejected. These included the ATMs of public sector banks like State Bank of India (SBI) and that of private sector banks like HDFC as well. For Ramsaran Bisariya in Bairagarh, the day began with turning away empty handed from an SBI ATM in his locality. In need of cash, he had to spent a good part of his day searching for an ATM with cash from Bairagarh to New Market. He said he has tried ATMs of Punjab National Bank, Andhra Bank and HDFC at New Market. "None of them have any cash," he said. Bisariya's search ended at an ATM located at the GTB complex post noon. Rajesh Kumar, an HDFC bank debit card holder, had similar woes to share. "For the past two days, there is no cash in any of the ATMs I visited," he said. A number of ATMs in the city are cash dry since April 1 as they are not replenished. Requesting anonymity, a senior SBI official said, " Banks were closed for two days for year-end clearances which was followed by a Sunday. As such, most of the ATMs could not be filled with cash." SBI has 436 ATMs in Bhopal city -- the maximum number for any bank. The bank official said the ATMs are being replenished. However, by 4pm on Monday, 40 ATMs of the bank were still left to be refilled, said another officials of the bank. III. http://www.business-standard.com/article/finance/weekend-fy17-closing-hit-atm-cash-filling-operations-117040500068_1.html Weekend, FY17 closing hit ATM cash-filling operations SBI said the cash crunch problem was acute in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana Priya Nair & Abhijit Lele | Mumbai April 5, 2017 Last Updated at 02:30 IST A large number of people complained of no cash at bank ATMs in the past few days, as the closing of the financial year, coupled with a weekend, hit the cash-filling operations in some parts. However, with improvement in deployment of money by cash management firms, the situation would be back to normal soon, bankers said. Rituraj Sinha, president of Cash Logistics Association of India, said ATMs had run dry in a few pockets at places like Mumbai owing to holiday (including weekend) and bank staff being occupied with financial year-end work. Two senior public sector bank executives said cash-filling at ATMs was minimal over the weekend. Work on closing the books for financial year 2016-17 and the weekend affected the operations, they added. The situation will be back to normal in a few days, a top State Bank of India (SBI) executive said. Rajeev Anand, executive director, Axis Bank, said, “Typically, the first few days of April see higher than normal withdrawal of cash due to the (financial) year-end. Hence, outflows from ATMs are slightly higher in some centres. Customers are depositing cash in branches and the situation should normalise.” While higher withdrawal may be a regular feature at this time of the year, this year bank branches are not getting enough cash to replenish the ATMs, which is adding to the problem, said an official of another private bank. Following the demonetisation move announced in November 2016, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had imposed a cap of Rs 24,000 per week on cash withdrawal at bank branches and a cap of Rs 4000 per day on ATM withdrawal. These caps were removed on March 13. However, despite the removal, cash withdrawals seem on a decline, says a recent report by SBI. Weekly cash withdrawals totalled Rs 34,500 crore on March 17 and Rs 32,500 crore on March 24, the report said. SBI said the cash crunch was acute in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, as supply of currency from the RBI was much less than the usual demand. While the demand is about Rs 250 crore daily, supply has been about Rs 50 crore. Banks are constantly in touch with RBI for more. As for other places in the country, it is a problem in a few pockets due to local distribution where ATM-filling is outsourced. It is not a problem of cash supply, the SBI executive said. -- Peace Is Doable -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
