introduction of drop box facility for cheques and acknowledgement of receipts / cheques through regular collection at branches, issue of statement of accounts at monthly intervals with details of various transactions, to provide at least one month ’ s advance information in case of any change in minimum balance in saving accounts and charges of non - maintenance thereof ; etc. • the committee had commended the clean note policy of the rbi and rbi is striving to vigorously pursue a largely successful clean note policy ; • the rbi note refund rules are now in the public domain. • banks are now required to have a customer service committee of the board so that the subject gets special focussed attention. we in rbi are hopeful that such an institutional arrangement will go a long way in improving services of banks. any debate, any talk, any deliberations about the customer service in banking would remain incomplete without reference to the late shri m. r. pai, who pioneered the consumer protection movement in the banking sector. his contribution through the all india bank depositors association in educating bank depositors is path breaking. i quote shri pai ’ s words, “ the biggest asset on the balance sheet of banks today is the ignorance of customers of their rights and their reluctance to fight for them ”. on conceptual ground quality of service is two dimensional. first dimension is the technical quality and the other is the functional quality. technical quality depends on the contents of the service, i. e., authenticity of the service, if the information given to the customer is technically correct or not and frequency of information dissemination, while the functional quality deals with how service is rendered. this in common parlance is “ service with a smile ”. it would appear that banking services in india need to improve on both counts. often customers do not get correct information in banks and more often a customer gets service as if he was being obliged. banking services are unique in the sense that diverse customers have multi facet needs and, therefore, benchmarking of banking services becomes a difficult task. no doubt, a system of citizens ’ charter has been introduced in various banks but this only deals with the time limit within which a service would be rendered to the customers. this does not assure quality of service. indian banks ’ association ( iba ) has also played a complementary role in efforts for improving customer service in banks. last year, with rbi initiative iba has come out with a model fair practices code. the code is a public document that enlists what

division of tasks with the imf and in coordination with other multilateral development banks, international financial institutions, and the donor community. the diffusion and depth of the crisis put an extra premium on the role of both bretton woods institutions, as providers of financial and advisory services and as facilitators of international dialogue. the economic stimulus that is required is an opportunity to respond to both immediate economic needs and long - term development priorities, building resilience to environmental, economic and social vulnerabilities. it presents a chance to kick off a new phase of reconstruction, steered toward poverty reduction and inclusive, sustainable growth. and it may allow us to refocus our efforts towards meeting the sustainable development goals. most ida countries lack the resources necessary to mount an emergency response while maintaining adequate spending on health, education, social safety nets, and job creation. we welcome the proposal put forth by the wbg and the imf and endorsed by the g20 for all official bilateral creditors to temporarily suspend debt - service payments from the poorest countries to help them meet their financing needs. we look forward to an effective coordination and broad participation of all major creditors, to ensure the success of this initiative.