Rule change that impact you from October 1

1) Pension Rule Change

Starting from October 1, 2021, the rules related to digital life certificates are going to change. This is for anyone above the age of 80. In October, pensioners above the age of 80 years will have the facility to submit their digital life certificate at the Jeevan Pramaan Center of all the Head Post Offices of the country. The deadline to carry out this task has been set as November 30, 2021. As a result of the widespread nature of this task, the Indian Postal Department had been asked to ensure that the ID of these Jeevan Pramaan Centers are activated in the event that they are already closed.

2) Chequebook Rule Change

From the next calendar month, the old chequebooks and MICR codes of the three banks will become invalid. Namely, the Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC), United Bank of India and Allahabad Bank. The banks had taken to Twitter to announce these changes on the back of the recent mergers that they underwent. Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC) and the United Bank of India which had merged with Punjab National Bank announced through the official Twitter account of Punjab National Bank that they would be halting old chequebooks and pre-existing MICR codes and IFSC codes come October if they were not updated by that time. Hence, it is important that you get these things renewed with your respective bank branches if you are a customer of these lenders.

3) Auto Debit Facility Rule Change

According to a recent mandate by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the facility for auto-debit from your credit card/debit card will undergo some changes. Specifically, the apex bank has mandated that all banks carry out an ‘Additional Factor Authentication’. This means that your monthly utility bills or monthly auto-debit transactional subscriptions like Netflix, Amazon Prime and so on will not go through without your approval. The notification to carry this out will be sent to customers by the relevant bank 24 hours ahead of the payment, once you approve and authenticate the transaction, the money will be debited from the account. This notice can come in the form of SMS or E-mail.

4) Investments to Undergo Rule Change

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has brought in a rule keeping in mind the interests of mutual fund investors. This rule will apply to junior employees who work in Asset Under Management (AMC) ie Mutual Fund House. Junior employees of asset under management companies will have to invest 10 per cent of their gross salary in units of that mutual fund with effect from October 1, 2021. Following the phase-wise format, in October 2023, the same will require these employees to invest 20 per cent of their salary. This investment will have a lock-in period.