The Bangladesh Bank on Sunday increased the limit of foreign currency to $20,000 that any software and IT firms could remit abroad without the prior approval of the central bank in a year for bona fide business.

The central bank in a circular said that the limit of money that could be remitted for software and IT firms from their exporter’s retention quota accounts with authorised dealer banks had been increased to $20,000 from $10,000.

The authorised dealer banks on behalf of IT and software firms can remit the foreign currency to meet the firms’ ‘bona fide expenses’ such as the payment of international alliance and fees for software registration, domain registration and hosting, server maintenance, account verification and remittance test.

The central bank issued the circular amending another circular that was issued on September 2, 2010.
In the new circular, bank also increased the limit for the issuance of international card to a nominated official of a software and IT firm to $2,000 from the revised total limit of $ 20,000. The earlier limit for international cards was $1,000.

The central bank said that other conditions of the circular issued in 2010 for remittance abroad by IT and software firms would remain unchanged.

The 2010 circular said that the authorised dealer banks with which a software and IT firm has an account would ensure the services against which fees have been remitted are subsequently delivered.

It said that the Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services would issue a letter of recommendation for a particular firm to a specific authorised dealer of the applicant’s choice.
The international cards will also be issued at the recommendation of BASIS.