BoB’s Agency Banking, BoBConnect Agents could lose their agent-ship if they do not follow due process for banking services. This is following the recent case in Gelegphu where a woman lost all her savings after losing her mobile phone.
“As per the agreed Standard Operating Procedure, customers should come to the agent in person and they have to produce an identity card. With regard to the Gelegphu case, the agents have verified only the one-time password (OTP), and not the customer and the CID. If the agents verified CID and the person, such fraud wouldn’t have happened in the first place,” said Ugyen Tenzin, Head of BoB’s Mobile and Agency Banking.
He said strict actions will be taken against the agents henceforth if they fail to follow the due process. “The customer had lodged a complaint with the police and it is being investigated. Once it is complete, we will get a report and the bank will decide on what actions to take on the matter.”
Last month, Mamta Darjay from Gelegphu lost all her savings from her BoB savings account. She came to know about it only after an agent visited her home to inform her she has withdrawn Nu 10,000 in excess. She runs a canteen at one of the automobile workshops in the new Industrial Service Centre in Gelegphu. On June 6 she lost her mobile phone from the canteen. With most of her personal details stored on the phone, the thief was able to empty her account of Nu 595,000 through the BoB’s Agency Banking, BoBConnect Agents. The suspect, an Indian national, identified as an auto electrician in the same workshop withdrew the money from five Agency Banking in Gelegphu till June 9. He left for India on June 17.
Following the incident, the woman had accused five agents in Gelegphu of not following due process for cash withdrawals. She also alleged that the five agents should be held accountable for losing her life savings.
Ugyen Tenzin from the BoB said there were also lapses on the woman’s part as she did not notify the bank when she lost her phone. “The bank would like to request customers not to share their personnel details, not to store them in their phone, and not to share with anyone else.”
The BoB initiated BoBConnect Agents in 2017 to facilitate services such as fund transfers and cash withdrawals among others. The bank appoints agents in communities. And the agents are given some amount as commission. The service is provided through OTP, meaning a request for withdrawal will be initiated after the client show the OTP received on their mobile phones from the bank. The client is also required to provide a citizenship identity card/work permit and account numbers for identification. People can withdraw a maximum of Nu 10,000 at a time.
Choni Dema
