Can’t bank on atms, 90% dry

A month after the demonetisation came into effect, 90 per cent of the ATMs in city still do not dispense cash. Placards with ‘out of cash’ or ‘no cash’ written on them continue to greet people at most

Retired 90-year-old BBMP employee Jayaramappa coming out of Corporation Bank’s Mysore Road branch after withdrawing his pension.

BENGALURU: A month after the demonetisation came into effect, 90 per cent of the ATMs in city still do not dispense cash. Placards with ‘out of cash’ or ‘no cash’ written on them continue to greet people at most of the ATM kiosks.

Be it in Koramangala, HSR Layout, Jayanagar and other parts of South Bengaluru or Sahakara Nagar and Kodigehalli in North Bengaluru, shutters of majority of the ATMs were down when the Express team went on a reality check.

News of introduction of Rs 500 note had brought much cheer for citizens, who were struggling to counter change for `2,000 notes. But the joy was short-lived as ` 500 note failed to reach the common man. Many bank staff are also yet to see the new `500-note.

A customer with the new `500 notes at Canara Bank ATM’s Town Hall branch. The shutter of Vijaya Bank ATM on busy Cunningham Road remained down in Bengaluru on Thursday | vinod kumar t

Every citizen these days has just one question to ask: Where is all the cash going?
A senior official from ICICI Bank said, “RBI is not releasing notes for the ATMs. With the limited cash sent to us, we can either serve the people coming to our bank or refill the ATMs. Since we have to answer our customers when they visit the branch, we prefer dispensing cash via banks over ATM.“

“RBI gave us `2 lakh in Rs 10 coins. How can we load these coins in the ATMs? I have been dealing with cash for a long time now, but even I have not yet seen the new ` 500 note,” said another bank official of Lakshmi Vilas Bank.

Another bank official said, “The lack of availability of cash is due to hoarding of money by the citizens.”
An official from Axis Bank said, “ATMs are either filled in the morning or evening. But these days cash gets over in just 2-3 hours in an ATM.”

Some banks also ran out of cash in city. 
A senior official from a nationalised bank said, “Huge queues outside banks and ATMs are mainly due to limitation on withdrawals and unavailability of cash at ATMs. We have limited cash and unlimited demand. the ` 500-note has been given to only a few banks for circulation. New notes of ` 100 are, however, available in the ATMs.”

A security guard at Karnataka Bank ATM in HSR Layout said, “Nobody has come to load the ATM in past two days.”
Rajeev, a resident of SG Palya says, “I ended up going to 10 ATMs in search of money. But none of them were functional. I had to end up waiting in the bank.”