(Image source from: bfsi.eletsonline.com)

Money can be transferred round-the-clock through National Electronic Funds Transfer(NEFT) from Monday.

NEFT is used to transfer money from one bank account to another electronically with a benefit that the bank account to which the money gets transferred will be received within two hours.

The transaction of amount via bank accounts through NEFT was earlier available only on the days when banks were open and the transactions had to be done between 8am to 7 pm with the first and third Saturdays between 8am to1 pm.

However, Reserve Bank of India stated early this month that the services of NEFT will be made available 24*7 I.e., including weekends and holidays from December 16. as settling the last NEFT payment ends at 11:30 pm and the next batch begins at 12:30 am the next day, transactions may not be done for an hour between 11:30 pm and 12:00 am.

‘Straight Through Processing(STP)’ will be used for automating the transactions that are done after banking hours. In case of NEFT credits, a confirmation message would be sent by the bank.

Transferring amount higher than Immediate Payment Service (IMPS) via NEFT will now be possible on any day rather than being available on all days with a limit of Rs 2 lakh.

It is said that, the variation in the maximum NEFT limit would be from bank to bank depending on the customer category. For example, the NEFT transfers in ICICI Bank are in the range of Rs 10 lakh to Rs 25 lakh.

NEFT transfers for HDFC bank has Rs 25 lakh limit and has Rs 10 lakh limit for retail customers in SBI.

The transaction fees imposed on the NEFT transactions have been waved off by the RBI in July and has also proposed to instruct banks to make free for saving bank accounts on all online NEFT transactions from January 2020.

By Shrithika Kushangi