Following the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) directive that banks must sign a new bank locker agreement with their customers on or before December 31, 2022, not many seem to have adhered to the new guidelines yet. This is because experts say that locker is not a subject that customers engage with daily unlike a mobile app or a savings account or a debit or a credit card, and consumers do not respond to every communication immediately.
So, what happens if one has one signed the new locker agreement yet? “It is like in general banking. For instance, if we have marked 100 customers and 12 have signed the amendment and the other 88 have yet not signed. So that’s recorded in my record book and as and when those customers are going to come, I will first get them to sign the addendum and then I will give them the access to continue to use the locker,” says Puneet Kapoor, President – Products, Alternate Channels and Customer Experience Delivery, Kotak Mahindra Bank.
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The revised rules were applicable to existing customers from January 2023 and were already in force for new customers from January 2022. The new locker agreement says that the new agreement must not have any clauses that are unfair to the customers. For example, one of the important clauses state that the banks’ liability shall be for an amount equivalent to one hundred times the prevailing annual rent of the safe deposit locker in case of any liability of banks arising from events like fire, theft, burglary, dacoity, robbery, building collapse or in case of fraud committed by the employees of the bank.
“It has the responsibility to ensure that incidents like fire, theft/ burglary/ robbery, dacoity, building collapse do not occur in the bank’s premises due to its own shortcomings, negligence and by any act of omission/commission. As banks cannot claim that they bear no liability towards their customers for loss of contents of the locker, in instances where loss of contents of locker are due to incidents mentioned above or attributable to fraud committed by its employee(s), the banks’ liability shall be for an amount equivalent to one hundred times the prevailing annual rent of the safe deposit locker,” according to RBI notification issued on August 18, 2021.
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Relating to insurance of locker contents by the customer, the agreement states that “Banks shall clarify in their locker agreement that as they do not keep a record of the contents of the locker or of any articles removed therefrom or placed therein by the customer, they would not be under any liability to insure the contents of the locker against any risk whatsoever. Banks shall under no circumstances offer, directly or indirectly, any insurance product to its locker hirers for insurance of locker contents.”
The August 18, 2021 notification by RBI also stated that “Banks shall have a Board approved agreement for safe deposit lockers. For this purpose, banks may adopt the model locker agreement to be framed by IBA. This agreement shall be in conformity with these revised instructions and the directions of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in this regard. Banks shall ensure that any unfair terms or conditions are not incorporated in their locker agreements. Further, the terms of the contract shall not be more onerous than required in ordinary course of business to safeguard the interests of the bank. Banks shall renew their locker agreements with existing locker customers by January 1, 2023.”
