ATM withdrawal? Count your cash

NEW DELHI: We told you last week about ATMs running out of cash just when you needed it most. You thought it couldn’t get worse than that. It has. Watch out for the teller machine which apparently doesn’t know how to count.
Ask Preet Sarai, lead analyst with AC Nielsen ORG-Marg. On the evening of September 2, he tried to withdraw Rs 15,000 from an ATM at South Extension Part-II, New Delhi.After he had entered the amount, the ATM screen flashed ‘network error’’ and the process was aborted without any cash being dispensed.
A little later, Sarai received an SMS (he had subscribed to the bank’s SMS-enabled services) stating that Rs 15,000 had been debited from his account. ‘‘I was stunned and couldn’t sleep the entire night. I needed the cash urgently to pay the EMI (equated monthly instalment) for my housing loan,’’ says Sarai.
‘‘The following day, I went to the nearest branch to complain. The assistant manager asked me to get in touch with the customer care cell. They asked me to wait for 24 hours, saying it took that much time for the bank to tally the cash in the ATM with the transactions made. I was told to register the complaint only if the amount hadn’t been credited to my account in 24 hours.’’
Eventually, the amount was credited back into Sarai’s account on the evening of September 5, but not before he had chased several bank officials for three days.
Consumer rights expert and Supreme Court advocate S K Sharma describes Sarai’s ordeal as the ‘‘fittest case under the Consumer Protection Act.’’
‘‘In cases like this, the bank should compensate for causing inconvenience to the customer. The value of the compensation should be calculated on the basis of the loss incurred by the customer,’’ he says.