National launch of Post Office Savings Bank ATM and Core Banking-Postal Life Insurance

Core Banking Solution (CBS)

India Posts is operating small savings schemes since 1882. Presently, the following 7 schemes are being offered- Savings Account, Recurring Deposit, Time Deposit, Monthly Income Account Scheme, Senior Citizens’ Savings Scheme, Public Provident Fund and National Savings Certificates (VIII and IXth Issue). The total number of accounts of Small Savings Schemes is 29.89 crores.

The Department of Posts has undertaken an end to end ‘IT Modernization project 2012’ to equip itself with requisite modern tools and technologies. In order to IT enable Post Office Savings Bank, Core Banking Solution (CBS) is being implemented across India covering all the post offices. At present, 64 Post Offices have been migrated into the CBS environment in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Assam and Andhra Pradesh. As on date, four Post Office Savings Bank ATMs have started functioning. M/s Infosys ltd. has provided the Core Banking Solution, Finacle, for the IT Modernisation Project of India Post.

Core Banking Solution (CBS) will enable customers to operate their accounts and avail account related services from any post office in the country. ‘Anywhere Anytime Banking’, Net-banking, RTGS, NEFT shall be available for the Post office customer. The objective of CBS is to provide faster and easier banking services through internet, mobile devices and ATMs

The Post Office ATM will facilitate the customer to withdraw money anytime. The ATM at Indraprastha Head Post Office and Delhi GPO will be replicated in 1000 locations across the country in the next few months. This will be scaled upto 2800 ATMs by 2015. 

A total of 600 Post offices in India will be migrated by March 2014 and 23207 Post Offices in India are to be migrated by 2015.

Postal Life Insurance (PLI)

Postal Life Insurance was started in 1884 and is open for employees of all Central and State Government Departments, Nationalized Banks, Public Sector Undertakings, Financial Institutions, Local Bodies like Municipalities and Zila Parisads, Educational Institutions aided by the Government etc. For further financial inclusion of rural public in general and to benefit weaker sections and women workers of rural areas in particular, Rural Postal Life Insurance scheme was started in 1995.

The Postal Life Insurance Fund has a corpus of close to Rs 40,000 crores which is invested in the securities market yielding a return of over 8% per annum. Postal Life Insurance offers the best return on investment in the life insurance sector. The McCamish based IT solution will enable the PLI and Rural PLI customers to pay their premium at any Post office counter across the country, make online premium payment, check their insurance accounts online, take maturity and loan payment from any Post office and utilize the services of a 24x7 customer helpline. The Core Insurance Solution shall be rolled out Pan-India and will integrate 810 insurance processing centres for faster claim settlement and after sales service for the people. It is proposed that 11,000 Post Offices shall be migrated by September 2014 and the remaining 14,000 Post Offices shall be migrated by March 2015.

Source:http://www.infosys.com/newsroom/features/pages/india-post-core-banking-insurance.aspx