Almost 2 weeks back on a sunny afternoon I had approached the front desk executive of Bhubaneswar branch of IDBI bank Ltd. for opening of an Saving Account. The executive readily relented to my request, sought the required documents along with the minimum balance criteria for opening an saving account. Obviously, I had gone prepared with all the documents he would ask for, albeit, I noticed myself to have possessed with more options of the alternatives documents than he required. Anyway, within a span of 15 minutes all formalities were over. The executive handed over an so called INSTANT ACCOUNT OPENING WELCOME KIT consisting of Instant Account number, a cheque book, Internet banking user name and password.
I came back from the bank contended with a broad smile on my face with the assurance that the account would be operational within next 3 working days, as usually. It was the incident of 9th June’03.On the same day, I was successfully logged on into the internet banking section of the https://idbibank.com with the given username and password. there was a welcome message with a ZERO BALANCE ACCOUNT TO MY CREDIT. I contacted to the executive the next day regarding the zero balance on my account whereas I have deposited certain amount of opening balance by cash. Their assurance: The default account balance will be replaced with the real within 3 days, when account will be operational.
I usually check my accounts on net. Nevertheless, after 7 days IDBI i-netbanking exhibited the same thing with a zero balance, signaling it’s non-operational status.
I immediately dashed off to the branch office, with an ever prevailing slogan ’’ what can I do for you? ’’, to inquire about my account. Actually, the man responsible for it was not in a position to explain me the real reason behind it. exquisitely, I got an answer ’’ wait!, perhaps will be alright today.’’ After 2 days, I contacted again to be heard about a missing document to be re-submitted. I complied with it within a hour. There after, it’s almost 13 days, I just keeps checking the account on internet and call up the branch office everyday to be . But, there is no respite. It’s inconceivable for an outstanding bank like IDBI BANK could take 15 days for opening an account on this networked era. It’s grossly irresponsibility on the part of some feckless persons, who do nothing better than to botch up the goodwill of a prominent organisation like IDBI.
Isn’t the inefficiency and mismanagement appended with unreliability in banking sector acceptable? A million-dollar question to be examined out by the policy makers at the top.