Normal working hour for financial institutions from Wednesday

The Bangladesh Bank has instructed financial institutions to resume normal working hours from 11 August (Wednesday), maintaining social distancing measures and health guidelines amid Covid-19 pandemic.

All branches of financial institutions will have to reopen for operations from 10am to 6pm, according to a notice issued by Bangladesh Bank on Tuesday.

Earlier, the central bank instructed financial institutions to operate on a limited scale only, instead of the normal 10am-6pm timings.

Now, financial institutions are returning to normal operations from Wednesday as the ongoing lockdown is being relaxed from 11 August.

In another circular, the Bangladesh Bank has changed the daily timings for interbank cheques clearing process following the government's decision of relaxing lockdown.

In a notification to scheduled banks on Tuesday, the central bank set 12pm and 3pm as the presentment cut off time and return cut off time respectively for clearing high value cheques (Tk5 lakh and above).  

For regular value cheques (below Tk5 lakh), the regulator set 12:30pm and 5pm as the presentment cut off time and return cut off time respectively.

Transactions utilising the Bangladesh Bank's Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system will continue from 10am to 4pm. However, payment of customs duties, fees, charges and interbank transactions can be carried out until 5pm.

The notification points out that the new schedule will remain effective until further notice and two sessions of the Bangladesh Electronic Funds Transfer Network (BEFTN) service will remain unchanged.

However, from Wednesday all branches of banks will have to reopen also for transactions at normal 10am to 4pm timings, and bankers will have to stay at the bank premises till 6pm to complete official tasks, according to a latest notice issued by Bangladesh Bank.