After a bank refused to accept his bundles of Rs 20 notes and overcharged him for counting the cash, causing mental agony, a man in Kerala successfully fought a legal battle against the bank and won compensation.
E A Baby of Angamaly in Kerala says his fight against Federal Bank was to prove that there is a legal system in our country for consumers to fight such injustice. Baby fought against Federal Bank after the manager and cashier of the Perumbavoor branch refused to accept 10 bundles of cash, each containing 100 numbers of Rs 20, and collected an amount of Rs 100 for counting the cash while the prescribed counting charge was only Rs 50 plus GST.
“I felt insulted when I went to the bank with Rs 20 denomination notes to deposit into an account. The cashier was arrogant with me when I presented the cash at the counter and asked me to find other means to transfer the amount to the account. When I went to the branch manager with my grievance, he also behaved rudely with me,” Baby told “Open Digest.”
Being a finance professional who has been handling accounts for several organisations, Baby used to deposit money regularly in different banks and was familiar with the fees for counting charges. When he told the bank that he was ready to pay the counting charges, the cashier accepted the money, charging Rs 100 additional as a counting charge.
“Though the bank refunded Rs 41, which they had collected additionally from me after my lawyer sent a legal notice to the bank, I decided to pursue the case with the consumer court because of the mental agony I suffered due to the arrogant behaviour of the bank staff,” Baby said.
The incident took place on August 31, 2017, at the bank, and Baby, through his lawyer Arun Ashok Iyyani, relentlessly pursued the case for the last five years to get due compensation from the bank.
While the bank contested Baby’s submission, arguing that the complaint was not maintainable either in law or on facts because the complainant was trying to grab money from the bank with a concocted story of alleged indecent behaviour and mental agony, the Ernakulam District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, led by its president D B Binu and members V Ramachandran and Sreevidhia T N, observed that the complainant suffered mental agony, pain, and other hardships due to the deficient act of the bank, which is liable to compensate the complainant. They directed the bank to not only refund the excess amount of Rs 50 collected from the complainant but also pay an amount of Rs 8,000 as compensation.
