Cash-for-card at 5,000 petrol pumps but currency still a hurdle

NEW DELHI: More than 5,000 petrol pumps of public sector oil companies across the country have started dispensing cash to debit card holders as banks scramble to upgrade their POS (point of sale, or card-swipe) machines but availability of currency remains an issue.

All India Petroleum Dealers Association

president

Ajay Bansal

said HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank had started upgrading their card-swipe machines and hoped to achieve the targeted number of 20,000 pumps in the next 2-3 days.

These two banks account for some 60% of card-swipe machines deployed at 52,000 petrol pumps out of the 53,842 public sector fuel retail outlets across the country. There are 56,190 petrol pumps in the country, including those run by private oil companies that have not been allowed to offer the cash-dispensing service.

“We have advised them to focus on rural areas. We also understand their problem since technicians have to go to each pump to upgrade the software in the card machines to include the ‘cash’ option,” Bansal said.

So far, HDFC has upgraded card machines at 2,000 outlets and ICICI at 1,700. State

Bank of India

, the country’s largest lender, has card machines at 2,400 petrol pumps and has enabled 1,400 of these with the cash option.

But ready cash for dispensing against debit card swipes remains a problem. Bansal said SBI offers Rs 1 lakh against a cheque from the petrol pump for dispensing against debit card swipes. Once this money is exhausted, it offers another cache against cheque and dispensing details for the previous lot. But HDFC and ICICI are yet to put in place their cash delivery system and insist that petrol pumps service debit cards with cash from fuel sales.

“Petrol pumps are running short of change to service fuel consumers who come in with Rs 2,000 note and buy petrol or diesel for Rs 300 or so in the hope of getting change in smaller denominations. When many pumps are unable to serve their normal clients, where do they get the cash to service debit card swipes?” Bansal asked.

He said even the Rs 1 lakh tranche was far too less against the demand. “With a daily withdrawal limit of Rs 2,000, this amount is gone with just 50 card-holders. So, one has to again ask for cash and go through the formalities… which is time-consuming,” Bansal said and suggested a fatter currency cache for dispensing to debit card holders.