Parliament asked to enact law on dud cheques

Sunyani (B/A), Dec. 27, GNA - A senior bank official in Sunyani has called on Parliament to enact a law to punish people who would issue out dud cheques.

Mr Ebenezer Kwame Adu Ntreh, Brong-Ahafo Area Manager of the Ghana Commercial Bank (GCB), cited that in some countries offenders were punished for issuing dud cheques.

He said: "If such a law is introduced in the country I believe there will be sanity and trust in the banking industry in Ghana". Mr Ntreh was speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Sunyani following complaints by a section of the public over the fixing of charge for bank draft at 75,000 cedis to non-customers of the Ghana Commercial bank.

The senior bank official explained that the GCB was only responding to a directive by Bank of Ghana to review charges in the banking industry.

Mr Ntreh expressed regret that people's mistrust in the cheque system had led to the insistence on bank drafts for special transactions by some institutions, especially schools.

He said it should be safe and convenient enough for parents to issue cheques for payment of their children's school fees but because some people issued fiasco cheques it has resulted in the unfortunate situation."

Mr Ntreh said the use of cheques would help to reduce the incidence of armed robbery in which people carrying large sums of cash were robbed of their money.

He further explained that until the middle of last month when the central bank issued the directive, bank draft transactions varied depending on the amount of money to be used in a transaction with special concession given to students' school fees.

Mr Ntreh said the more money one transacted through bank draft the higher the charge.

He cited that until the central bank's directive, GCB was collecting 15,000 cedis for any amount of school fees to be paid through the bank draft.

Mr Ntreh, however, said the directive gave dispensation to the bank's saving customers who would pay 50,000 cedis for any amount in the transaction while in some rural areas the charge was as low as 10,000 cedis.

He added: "If anything, it is rather the GCB that loses by the new directive as those who will do transactions in huge sums will gain."