RBI issued Uniform Guidelines on Internet Banking for Cooperative Banks

Reserve Bank of India(RBI) granted state co-operative banks (StCBs) and district central co-operative banks (DCCBs) to bestow internet banking with “view only” facility.

Urban cooperative banks (UCBs) that meet positive benchmark are authorized to implement internet banking with transactional facility to their customers with prior approval of the RBI. This facility is allowed to be given by all UCBs keeping in with certain conditions without RBIs approval.

• Some of the StCBs and DCCBs have requested for permission to offer internet banking facility.It has been decided to allow StCBs and DCCBs to extend the facility of internet banking to their customers.

Guidelines on Internet Banking :

• The guidelines issued were reviewed and uniform guidelines for all the cooperative banks are now issued in supervision of past guidelines issued to UCBs in the matter.
• All StCBs, DCCBs and UCBs that have implemented Core Banking Solution (CBS) and drifted to Internet Protocol Version 6 may offer internet banking (view only) facility to their customers, without prior approval of RBI.
• In case any service offered under view only facility requires two-factor authentication or One Time Password (OTP)
• Facility is strictly for non-transactional services such as balance enquiry, balance viewing, account statement download, request for supply of cheque books, etc. and no online fund-based transactions are allowed.

StCBs, DCCBs and UCBs who wants to give internet banking with transactional facility must get RBI approval with the conditions that capital adequacy ratio is not less than 10 per cent

• Net worth is Rs 50 crore or more as of March 31 of the preceding fiscal
• Gross non-performing assets (NPAs) are less than 7 per cent
• Net NPAs are not more than 3 per cent.

Other conditions:

• Such banks should have made a net profit in the immediate preceding financial year and overall net profit at least in three out of the preceding four financial years
• Should not have defaulted in maintenance of CRR/SLR during the immediate past financial year
• Should also have a track record of regulatory compliance, with no monetary penalty being imposed on them for violation of RBI guidelines during the two financial years preceding the year in which the application was made.

Key points :

• RBI  Headquarters: Mumbai, Maharashtra
• RBI Governor : Raghuram Rajan