Cash Crunch: SBI Asks Customers To Withdraw Up To Rupees 2,000 Per Day From PoS Machines For Free

Amid the cash crunch faced by the country, State Bank of India (SBI), today allowed customers to withdraw money up to Rs 2,000 via Point of Sale (PoS) machines. The largest lender of the country said that it is providing facilities of cash withdrawal through ‘Cash@POS’ initiative to ease the liquidity deficit. Cash@POS is a facility using which debit card holders can withdraw cash by swiping their debit/prepaid cards at SBI PoS terminals at merchant locations, said SBI. As per the guidelines issued by Reserve Bank of India (RBI), customers can withdraw Rs 1,000 in Tier I and Tier II cities whereas Rs 2,000 can be withdrawn in Tier 3 to Tier 6 cities per day per card.
 
"Debit card holders of SBI and all other banks can withdraw cash from PoS machines installed by SBI across various merchant locations. Presently, the bank will not be charging any fees", said the state-run bank in a press release.
 
PoS machines are installed with various vendors. They are electronic devices used to process card payments at retail locations.

SBI has a total of 6.08 lakh PoS machines of which 4.78 lakh are enabled to dispense cash.

As on December 31, 2017, SBI has a deposit base of Rs. 26.51 lakh crore. It has 32.16 per cent market share in home loans and 35.54 per cent in auto loans. The bank also has 22,584 branches in the country and ATM network of nearly 59,000 ATMs.

On Wednesday, SBI said that the availability of cash in its network of ATMs had improved in the past 24 hours.

Earlier in the day RBI also placed restrictions on the business activities of Mumbai-based City Co-operative Bank and also said that customers of the co-operative bank will not be allowed to withdraw more than Rs. 1,000 per deposit account. City Co-operative Bank will also have to take prior approval from the central bank before it can accept fresh deposits, disburse loans, make any investment, or borrow funds, the RBI said.