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| Advocacy Impact: MahaRERA Regulates Retirement Homes; Bank Service Charges Report Released |
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| Dear Moneylifers, |
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 Greetings! Let me start with good news for senior citizens in Maharashtra who may opt to move to Retirement Homes. On 8th May, Maharashtra became the first state to issue formal guidelines for the construction of Retirement Homes. The guidelines were issues by MahaRERA, the state realty regulator and we are delighted that Chairman Ajoy Mehta was so pro-active in responding to our Study on Retirement Homes (2017) , the model guidelines issued by the Centre and issuing draft guidelines in February that were converted to formal regulations in May. |
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 You can read them here: Moneylife Impact: Maharashtra's MahaRERA is the First to Regulate Retirement Homes. The guidelines establish mandatory standards for developers and service providers in the retirement housing sector, covering key aspects such as accessibility, safety and security, living environment and senior-friendly design. |
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| India's senior citizen population is over 150 million and will rise to 20% of the total population by 2050. This means that more and more people will be moving to retirement homes over the years. This means that other states in India, especially those with higher incomes and more children abroad need to adopt similar guidelines. It has taken five years and a pro-active minister in Hardeep Singh Puri at the centre to reach this stage. We need your support and ideas to take it forward to other states. Do write to us with suggestions if any. |
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| Launch of Our Report on Service Charges in Banks |
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| The other big development last month was the launch of our study on - 'Benchmarking Reasonableness in Service Charges by Banks in India' by Prof Ashish Das of IIT Mumbai. It was launched at the hands of Mr S.S Mundra, former deputy governor of Reserve Bank of India (RBI). If you want to know which bank is most fair to you in terms of charges, or if you are the HR person deciding on where to park your payroll account, check out our report. This is the first time you have a scientific comparison of key service charges levied by 25 top banks. You can access the report on our website here: https://www.mlfoundation.in/memorandum/benchmarking-reasonableness-of-service-charges-by-banks-in-india/357.html |
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| In case you missed the launch and subsequent discussion on its findings, you can check the video recording on our YouTube channel here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaWFXjrYp20 and also read about it here - Moneylife Foundation's Pathbreaking Study Identifies the Best and Worst Banks in India in Terms of Service Charges |
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| Our study has graded, rather than ranked banks. You would be surprised to know that only three scheduled commercial banks and two cooperative banks were in the A grade. They were - IDFC First, Bandhan and AU Small Finance as well as Saraswat Bank and SVC Bank. Axis Bank and Canara Bank were in the 'D' category. Take a minute to hear what top functionaries of the best banks had to say at the launch event: Moneylife Event: How Customer-centric Bankers Approach Bank Charges |
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| Our objective in doing this study is not only to persuade the regulator to ensure that such data and basis of comparison is available on a public dashboard on a continuous basis for the benefit of customers. The regulator has investor funds available with it to make this possible. We would also like the regulator to define the term reasonable, keeping in mind the fact that banks earn a fair bit on the money that we entrust to them, to cover some basic service costs. |
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| The report has been submitted to RBI for their review and consideration, and we will continue our advocacy efforts to ensure positive action is taken to address the issues identified in the study. |
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| Counselling and Helplines |
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| If you have concerns or queries regarding housing societies, banking, insurance, medi-claim or consumer related matters, and want to seek advice from our counselors, please call our office (022) 35131664 or 35036925 for an appointment. In case you are unable to meet our counselors in-person, you can still seek guidance from our legal helpline. Please also make an effort to visit and share the links to our website, where you can read more about cases of mis-selling, fraud alerts, consumer cases and also solutions to housing society problems. |
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| Financial Literacy Videos in Indian Languages: |
- Credit cards
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| Get guidance and counselling through our Legal Helpline or Credit Helpline. |
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| Sucheta Dalal |
| Founder-Trustee, Moneylife Foundation |
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| Trustees: TS Krishnamurthy, Walter Vieira, Sucheta Dalal, Debashis Basu. | | | | Moneylife Foundation is registered with the Charity Commissioner of Mumbai, is an Affiliate member of OECD's International Network on Financial Education, is a Supporter Member of Consumers International, Development Partner of Advocates for International Development (A4ID), and is a winner of the 10th MR Pai Memorial Award. | | |  | | | | Donations are eligible for tax benefits under Sec 80G of the Income Tax 1961 (50% tax exemption) and MLF is registered under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 2010. 80(G) Reg No: DIT(E)/MC/80G/685/2010-11 dated 7.2.11 effective 8.+9.2010 | FCRA Registration No: 08378138  | | | |
