Banks fill up ATMs on holiday eve

Commercial banks, particularly the ones in the new private and foreign sector, are not taking any chances. They are stashing the over 15,000 automated teller machines (ATMs) across the country with extra cash to avoid any inconvience to their customers over the Diwali weekend.

It's a long weekend for the banking industry. Banks are closed between Friday and Monday with only half day of work thrown in on Saturday.

The use of credit card is rising in urban India but cash is still important on a diwali weekend as one cannot buy sweets and crackers with a piece of plastic. Morever, the chauffers and cooks only acccept cash as Diwali 'baksheesh'.

As the economy is booming, banks are expecting as much 100 per ent jump in public spending and longer queues at the ATMs. ICICI Bank, the country's largest private sector bank with an ATM network of around 1,800 ATMs, has geared up for the busy weekend.

"We are expecting daily withdrawals to range from Rs 130-150 crore this weekend as against an average of Rs 100-110 crore a day. The extra cash loading in our machines will range from 25-50 per cent over and above the average, depending on whether they are based in low traffic or high traffic zones," said P Srivastava, general manager, ICICI Bank.

After experiencing a run on a few of its branches and ATMs in Gujarat a year back, ICICI Bank set up as many as 22 currency vaults across the country last year. These are located close to the bank's ATMs within a four-hour driving distance of each of them.

India's largest foreign bank Standard Chartered Bank typically loads its 150 ATMs with Rs 7 crore on a weekday and Rs 11 crore in the weekend.

"We are planning to load about 20-25 per cent more cash i.e., (Rs 13.20-13.75 crore) for Friday. On Saturday we will monitor the position and load (another Rs 14-15 crore) for the Sunday-Monday holiday," said Shalini Warrier, head-branch banking & service, Standard Chartered Bank.

In case the demand overshoots projected levels the custodians i.e., the key holders of the ATMs, have access to the respective bank's multiple cash vaults. These custodians are supposed to be available 24X7.

UTI Bank with its 1,450 machines is seeing a 100 per cent jump in volumes since it shares its network with a host of other banks.

Aspy Engineer, vice president, retail banking, UTI Bank said, "On an average daily cash dispensation for the bank is around Rs 45 crore but we will load Rs 90 crore today and again refill it on Saturday for the high-spending weekend."

HDFC Bank is seeing heavy demand from cities and towns across the country. Said Rahul Bhagat, vice president (alternate channels), HDFC Bank, "We will top up our machines to the maximum capacity both on Saturday and in case of an emergency we will top-up on Sunday too."

On a normal day, the daily cash withdrawals at the bank's ATMs clock Rs 85 crore which will surge to Rs 135 crore this weekend. The cash loading amount typically varies from ATM to ATM depending on whether it is in a high-traffic zone or a low traffic one.

For instance, Standard Chartered's busy ATM in Mumbai's western suburb of Santacruz typically sees 200-250 transactions with customers withdrawing as much as Rs 8-10 lakh. This is expected to jump to Rs 12.7 lakh a day for the festive weekend.