Suited for Conventional Banking
I have been banking with State Bank of India from 1985. My parents were banking with them from their young days (may be 1950s) . I cannot endorse the view that people are dissatisfied with SBI’s type of banking. It is wrong to compare the bank with all the mushrooms that have sprung up lately. The new ones do offer you internet banking, phone-banking, ATMs, credit cards, debit cards and what not! But you cannot trust them fully. They have not shown their credibility by being trustworthy in the market for many years. Also the new ones charge you specially for all these services they offer. Don’t know when they will disappear leaving you with problems (remember Global Trust?). Remember, that SBI is a truly “nationalised” bank, meaning they have to adhere to the Government’s banking dictums, not the whims and fancies of the market. They have a mission towards the agricultural, rural and poor sectors too, which is the main things aimed by the “garibi hatao” policies of the government. I have had many a bitter moments with SBI, but still I carry on banking with them, for the simple reason, that they serve the theme of the original “nationalisation” reason for banks. Recently I tried to register for their internet banking. I have an ordinary savings bank account as well as an NRE account with SBI. I called them up from the country of my residence regarding this. The manager very clearly told me why he cannot send the PIN details to my overseas address in the case of my local savings bank account. “Your residential address as per your SB account is local, Chennai. PIN details have to be personally received by you and not by some other person as it is so confidential. You cannot change your local address in your SB account as it is an important record like your passport, ration-card etc. We cannot send PIN details to your overseas address because that is not in our records. You can only demand for internet banking for your NRE account, which can done easily as that contains your overseas address. You cannot ask for internet banking for your local SB account unless you are residing locally now.”
After hearing him one can always jump to a sudden conclusion that SBI is not serving customers properly. But if you think deeply you will agree with the manager. They have specified rules which are meaningful. Yes, the bank is not so technologically advanced like the new ones or the foreign ones. But the millions in India who are not internet-savvy (like my mother), who do not know how to use an ATM or sign for credit-card purchases, can still happily bank with SBI. Withdrawals can still be done at the counter using withdrawal forms (some other banks charge you for visiting their manual counters), depositing of cash can be done thru their manual tellers, drawing and depositing cheques manually are easy and fool-proof. Hence SBI is still the best bank for conventional style of banking!