RBI advisory cautions public on depositing money with entities

Amid rising incidents of fraudulent investment schemes hitting investors, the Reserve Bank today asked the public to carefully evaluate their decisions before depositing money with financial entities including NBFCs.
The exhaustive advisory of dos and don'ts comes against the backdrop of investment schemes such as the multi-crore Saradha scam, which defrauded thousands of gullible investors in West Bengal.
"The advisory is part of the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) issued by the central bank. The FAQs explain in details the various kinds of financial entities and the regulations governing them," RBI said in a statement.
The advisory also listed as to where people can lodge complaints in case some financial entity is found to be conducting business unauthorisedly or does not repay the deposits.

The statement said that an investor wanting to place deposit with an NBFC must ensure that it is registered with RBI and is authorised to accept deposits.
This can be checked from the list of deposit taking NBFCs published on the RBI website - www.Rbi.Org.In, it said.

The depositor should check the list of NBFCs permitted to accept public deposits and also check that it is not appearing in the list of companies prohibited from accepting deposits, it added.
NBFCs have to prominently display the Certificate of Registration (CoR) issued by the Reserve Bank on its site. If an NBFC is authorised to accept public deposit, the certificate reflects that, it said.

RBI also advised that investors must generally be circumspect if the interest rates or rates of return on investments offered are higher than those offered by others in the market place.