Chennai: It has been 10 months since the post offices embraced a new core banking software designed by Infosys, but technical issues do not seem to decline. Even though the issue – tweaking of a lot of cards – was noticed a while back, the problem has not been completely rectified, rue regular account holders.
The software does not allow manual operations, causing great inconvenience to card users. V. Ramarao, a social activist said, ‘we welcome computerising the system. However, frequent teething problems put senior citizens and differently-abled in a spot. Manual operations cannot be done either.’
Ramarao who is a long time post card user said that the problem prevailed much in the divisions and not in the head offices.
In addition to it, non improvising the infrastructure in the post offices is a great hindrance to the card users, who are slowly switching on to other banking methods. Explaining the difficulty from a personal experience, C. Shantha said, “Most of the post offices are yet to get a proper printing machines. It is an irony that they write the transactions on the passbook and not printing it.”
Talking to Deccan Chronicle on the sidelines of national postal week celebrations, Postmaster general (Mails &BD), J.T. Venkateswarlu assured, “To suite our post office saving bank rules, we upgraded to finacle, a software developed by Infosys. As we had tweaked a lot of accounts, a delay in transactions was triggered. However, frequent batches were released and the problem is almost stabilized.”
When asked about developing the infrastructure, he said, “We have projected necessary funds for the same. India post has embarked on a mega IT project to embrace latest hardware like computers and passbook printers. We are awaiting funds from ministry of finance.” We expect the issues to be settled by March next year, he added.
Micro ATMs at post offices to enable cash withdrawals
Tamil Nadu, which is enjoying the status of possessing 96 postal ATM centres will soon enjoy the 24 hour money transactions in post offices, a facility that draws patronage. The move is another interesting facility added by India posts, with the recent one being development of a mobile application – Postman mobile – accounting for the safe and affordable delivery.
However, officials from the postal department spoke of no possibility to add another ATM centre in the near future in the state. Dr Charles Lobo, Chief Postmaster General, said, “The state with 96 ATM centres has already exceeded its quota of 94 centres, out of 1,000 centres in the country. Anna Road post office will be a Banking Correspondent (BC) model for the India Post payment bank scheme (IPPB) in the state.”
Micro ATM centres are proposed at the post offices and over 3,500 banking experts are deployed for the services in the country to establish the same, said Dr. Charles Lobo.
As the major target now lies in promoting the ATMs (Which work from 8am to 8pm) as 24-hour money transaction points, the department is working on software tweaking and integration with other banks. The postal department is also focusing on achieving targets for schemes like Sukanya Samridhi Yojana.
