The people who work five days a week, mostly from IT, look forward to weekends to visit the banks.
To be specific, the first and third Saturdays are windows for Indians who are still visiting banks on a weekend in the digital age.
At times these people have to watch out for bank holidays and strikes in the country, before planning procedures which require their presence.
However, this needs to be changed now as weekend visits to the local branch may not be possible, since lenders may shift to five-day work weeks.
Why Would This Happen?
It appears that the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) has agreed to give all Saturdays off to bank employees.
The decision was taken following discussions with the United Forum of Bank Employees.
But as always there is a catch as now the bank employees will have to work for more hours per day.
So, it looks like that the government as an owner of public sector lenders and the Reserve Bank of India will have to accept this, before they decide on new timings.
While the deal about working days was negotiated separately from wages, a senior union official wasn’t present reportedly.
LIC Made The Move Ahead
It appears that Life Insurance Corporation, popularly known as LIC is an Indian state-owned insurance group and investment company has already made the move.
Further, the report says that 40 minutes will be added to the daily work hours for bank staff, in exchange for two additional days off.
The move from IBA comes following the LIC’s acceptance of a five-day work week and plans for stock markets to align trading with western economies.
Here, bankers have acknowledged the fact that while ATMs and e-banking have become primary service channels for customers, there is still a set of people who visit their local branches regularly.
Besides this, Cash deposit machines and passbook printing devices have also been installed along with ATMs.
So that the bank visitors can benefit from these devices with self-service.
