Saturday, January 25, 2020




 Ref. No.: AIPSBCOEA/CHQ/ Input/Suggestion on prevention of Fraud/2019             dated- 16.9.19             

                                                                                              
To
              The Secretary,
              Department of Posts,
              Dak Bhawan, Sansad Marg,
              New Delhi – 110 001.

                                                             
Sub:     Submission of  Input/Suggestion on Prevention of Frauds reg…

Ref:     No.25-11/2016-FS-CBS,Govt of India, Ministry of Communication,   
            Department of Post(F.S Division) dated 11.9.19 at Dak Bhawan New Delhi- 110 001.

 Sir,

Input/Suggestion on prevention of frauds in CBS Post Offices:

In the recent memo No.25-11/2016-FS-CBS,Govt of India, Ministry of Communication,   
Department of Post(F.S Division) dated 11.9.19 at Dak Bhawan New Delhi-110 001 regarding input /suggestion on prevention of frauds in CBS Post Offices, the third point is about Signature checking of all closed accounts by SBCO in Finacle.

The duties of SBCO  are already  well defined in Manual for SB Control, Pairing & ICO Procedure.Accordingly the SBCO staff are exercising the decentralized Audit & Accounts duties and their work actually starts after accounting of the transactions. SBCO has to exercise the Audit work, (ie) thorough checking of all the mandatory items by doing 100% voucher checking including all closures as per control procedure laid down for SBCO and the SB ORDER 14/2015 and the Addendums w.r.t the AOF forms/SB-3 cards for signature of depositors.

But, checking the signature in Finacle is not laid down in the Control Procedure of SBCO and it is irrelevant to SBCO where as it is a prime duty on the part of  the counter staff  and APM only before effecting  payment of amount to the depositor to prevent Fraud.

The second point in the memo number mentioned above regarding sending of closure  passbooks  to SBCO along with the closure form SB-7A  will not prevent fraud in any way as Pass book is not mandatory for doing transactions across the counter in CBS environment.  The  entries are not being made at regular intervals in the PBs vide the printers and only manual entries are made by posting the last transaction along with the BAT in the PB. Also nowadays amount can not only be withdrawn through ATMs but also closed, transferred from POSB to IPPB and from IPPB to any other bank account  without  passbook.

Closure of accounts may be done with Aadhar enabled verification (finger print matching/Irish matching).The customers those who are unable to come to post offices may be given door step service for Aadhaar enabled verification with service charge. If door step service cannot be provided then inspecting officers may verify the genuineness by meeting the customers personally.

It is irony that the objection memos raised by SBCO must be paid serious attention and be settled without delay in Post offices which is the responsibility of the concerned postmasters as mentioned in the SB ORDER 14/2015 but, it is not adhered to. Instead reports are being asked from SBCO for early settlement of the same which is another reason for occurrence of frauds.

There is acute shortage of manpower at every level right from MTS to PA cadre which is the main reason of occurrence of frauds.  The work of  two to three PAs are done by a singe SBCO PA in most of the units and almost all H.Os are running without the supervisors   except very few which are managed by the junior officials who have just entered the department. The Association has already written letter regarding cadre restructuring to SBCO cadre to solve ths problem vide Ref. No:  AIPSBCOEA/CHQ/Ca dre restructure/2019  Dated- 28.08.2019. The shortage of manpower is experienced at the level of  the General line PAs  also which pave way  to the persons who do frauds intentionally and make the innocent officials  the scalp goats. A drive for recruitment may be conducted and vacancies may be filled upto the sanctioned strength as a one time measure.

The Silent revival (revival of dormant accounts) ,freezing and unfreezing of  a/cs with heavy amounts and exceeding the prescribed limits, transfers of sols, closures of B.Os / Single handed  SOs accounts , issue of duplicate Passbooks, issue of ATM cards , issue of cheque books  may be sent to the concerned H.Os for doing the same after verification by two Supervisors(APMs). A separate PA may be spared for the same like  that done for the claim sanction cases  as of now.

The higher value verification memos to be prepared every day at the SB branch and sent to the inspecting authorities who should verify the genuineness on daily  basis by meeting the depositors personally  and report the same.

Our Association would like to bring to the kind notice of the administration that prevention of Frauds can be done only  by evolving  necessary some additional ways and means at counter level  before effecting payment of amount to the customer and by entrusting the verification of genuineness of payment to the inspecting officers/field officers by visiting the depositors personally. 

It is requested that the suggestions  given above may be taken into consideration so  that the Frauds  can be prevented to some extent as the same have been heeped in crores of amount  after implementation of Finacle and CBS in savings bank comparatively more than when sanjay post was in usage. Hence the infrastructure and technology may be improved in such a way that except the depositor nobody can withdraw his money by linking Aadhaar , SMS alerts,OTP generation for closures and by making photograph of depositor mandatory which should be scanned for identification during payment of money at the counter. The Biometric method of payment was already suggested by our Association vide letter dated 1.3.17  which was the first item in the 25 charter of demands and the minutes was received for the same by 21.4.2017 in which the suggestion was not taken into account. Atleast now the same may be implemented to prevent the fraud upto 90% by biometric method.

SBCO section is responsible for its routine work of audit nature only (ie) downloading the datas from Finacle and finding out any violation of prescribed rules while carrying out  voucher checking with utmost concentration and raising of objections if needed.

The term AUDIT defines “an official inspection of an organizations account by an independent body and it cannot be expected to detect every fraud”.

The SBCO wing is doing the Audit work and hence may not be fixed as  the co-offenders or sub-offenders which is against justice of nature as SBCO officials are in no way connected with the monetary transactions  taking place across the counter directly.Many innocent SBCO officials are already being pulled inside the trap by some way or another and penalized with the recovery under contributory negligence , hence it is requested that the act of injustice  needed to be stopped immediately. The verification of signature in finacle and  giving the closed passbooks to SBCO will not prevent frauds instead it will pave way to penalize the SBCO officials who are already over burdened with work done by SOSB, Sub accounts, CC bridge , vide many orders issued day by day. It is therefore requested that instead of issuing some orders day by day a meeting may be called for with the concerned branches with their representatives along with the technology team to sit and discuss the ground reality and follow the measures which will be suggested by them.

The FRMU alert verification is also entrusted to SBCO which is an additional work and it is already emphasized by the Association that the same may be verified by the inspecting/investigating authorities or by a centralized team at RO/CO to serve the real purpose of prevention of Frauds vide the Association’s  letter Ref. No.: AIPSBCOEA/CHQ/FRMU/2019 dated 28.8.19.

Hence both point number 2 and 3 mentioned in the memo No.25-11/2016-FS-CBS,Govt of India, Ministry of Communication, Department of Post(F.S Division) dated 11.9.19 at Dak Bhawan New Delhi-110 001 regarding prevention of Frauds  may please be dispensed with as it is an extra burdern on SBCO and will only make the voucher checking pending in under staffed situation and not prevent the Fraud. Hope the administration would understand the core of the suggestions given by the Association and implement it favourably for the smooth functioning of POSB and SBCO cadre.




         
With Regards,

Yours Sincerely,         

                                                                                                                               -Sd-          
                                                                                                       (SHP. JASMINE JALAL BEGAM)  
                                                                                                                  General Secretary

Copy To:
The Assistant Director (SBPG)
F.S Division
Dak Bhawan New Delhi -110001.

                                                                                                                              -Sd-
                                                                                                        (SHP. JASMINE JALAL BEGAM)  
                                                                                                                    General Secretary


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