According to a recent report by the World Bank, around 19 crore Indian adults don’t have a bank account. That is like half of the nation’s population fall under the unbanked section of society. In the first place, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the India Post Payments Bank with an aim to provide basic financial services to the people in rural areas of India. In fact, this initiative was taken keeping in consideration of 1.55 lakh post offices in India.

Find out everything about India Post Payments Bank including the interest rates, benefits and more.

India Post Payments Bank – An Overview

India Post Payments Bank is a government-owned bank that is operated under the Department of Posts, Ministry of Communication. It started on 19th August 2015 when India Post received the banking license from the Reserve Bank of India. The bank commenced its operations from September 1, 2018. In fact, the first phase of the bank had 650 branches and 3250 post offices as access points.

In addition to offering savings and current accounts, the India Post Payments Bank provides the following services:

→ QR Card Payments

→ Unified Payments Interface

→ Immediate Payment Service

→ National Electronic Funds Transfer

→ Real-time gross settlement

→ Bharat BillPay

→ Direct Benefit Transfer

Types of Savings Account at India Post Payments Bank

The India Post Payments Bank offers three types of savings account with the zero-balance facility, unlimited withdrawals and more. To sum up, the three types of savings account are:

→ Regular Savings Account(Safal)

→ Basic Savings Account(Sugam)

→ Digital Savings Account(Saral)

Although the accounts are designed for different purposes, the common features of all the three savings accounts are:

⇒ No minimum balance

⇒4% interest rate

⇒ A holding of more than ₹1 lakh not permitted

⇒ No facility for joint account

⇒ Chequebook, debit card or ATM card facility not available

Here’s a little more on the three types of savings account of India Post Payments Bank:

Regular Savings Account(Safal)

Also known as the Safal Account, the Regular Savings Account is the one that provides the most benefits altogether. The account is popular to keep your funds secure, withdraw cash, deposit cash and provide a host of other benefits. Moreover, the regular savings account allows zero-balance and requires to maintain a monthly average balance.

Basic Savings Account(Sugam)

The basic savings account or Sugam account is designed to provide basic financial facilities at nominal charges. The account allows four cash withdrawals, unlike the regular savings account. The customers can also link the basic savings account to a post office savings account.

Digital Savings Account(Saral)

With the advancement in technology, now you can avail banking facilities digitally. The digital savings account is designed to cater to the needs of the tech-savvy customers. The account can be opened via the payment bank’s app. Any individual who is above the age of 18 years and has a PAN card and Aadhaar card can open an account. However, the customers are required to complete the KYC formalities within 12 months of opening the account. Failing to do so will result in the closure of the account. Thereafter, the account will be transferred into a regular savings account.

Benefits Of An IPPB Account

Besides bringing the unbanked section of society into the banking population, there are several other benefits of an IPPB account. The advantages of opening an IPPB account online are:

• Zero-balance accounts

All the three types of savings accounts at IPPB offer the zero-balance facility. In a simple word, it means no minimum balance required. However, the bank does not allow holding more than ₹1 lac in any account. In fact, the transaction gets automatically rejected if the transaction is above ₹1 lac.

• Doorstep banking

The IPPB account provides doorstep banking with the help of The Gramin Dak Sevak(GDS) or the postman. Moreover, there are no charges of opening an account using this facility. Once an account is opened, you can transfer funds, deposit or withdraw cash, and recharge or pay bills at nominal charges.

• QR Card

The account does not come with a chequebook(only for current accounts) and debit card. Instead, a QR card is provided to avail the financial services. This is a unique and convenient form to access your account. Moreover, the customer does not require to remember any password as the transactions are carried out via biometric authentication. The places where you can carry transactions with the QR card will have a scanning machine with a biometric authentication device-fingerprint reader.

• 4% interest rate on the savings account

All accounts from IPPB attract an interest rate of 4% per annum. Moreover, the interest rate is paid quarterly and is calculated on the closing balance.

Post Office Payments Bank Savings Account v/s Post Office Savings Account

In short, Post Office Payments Bank will help a lot of Indians to avail the basic financial services.