The Prime Bank board of directors has disapproved the bank management for charging the clients unlawfully and warned of refraining from such wanton actions. The bank also sent a letter to Bangladesh Bank on Sunday, seeking apology for their mistake in deducting money from clients’ accounts as charges of different services, which goes against the law. Recently, the central bank detected that Prime Bank realised Tk250m “illegally” from its account holders in the name of service charges. The bank deducted Tk230 per account – Tk200 as account statement generation fee and Tk30 as VAT – from all types of accounts like savings, current and special notice deposit (SND). It had around 1.2m accounts being maintained in 117 branches and 15 SME branches. Even after having realised the charges, it was not included in the “schedule of charges” published on its website. Meanwhile, the Prime Bank returned Tk260m to its nearly 800,000 clients’ accounts, following which the central bank through a letter issued on July 18 asked the bank to initiate action by August 5 against its officials involved in the illegal activities. In its replay through a letter, Prime Bank said the board reproved the management for such mistake and strongly warned it of not repeating the practice in future. “Chairman informed the meeting that the authorities of the central bank were not happy at the management response, regretting their actions on deduction of various charges from the customer’s account without following due procedures. They also advised taking administrative action against the offenders upon their identification,’’ the letter reads. The bank board expressed resentment and strongly criticised the wanton actions by the management. The board also decided to hear management views on the issue for further decision, according to the letter. On enquiry with the bank’s managing director and the entire senior management, the board deeply regretted the actions and admitted that despite being a collective decision, it was a mistake on their part. The management assured not to repeat such actions which might prove against the interest of general depositors and violation of Bangladesh Bank or the board directives. The board hoped that such strong warning to the management shall deter them from taking any such decision in future, which in any manner proves violation of the directives of the competent authorities or interest of the depositors, according to the letter. News:Dhaka Tribune Bangladesh/2-Sep-2013