As a post office savings program investor, you may have a single account or a joint account. The Government Savings Promotion General Rules, 2018 currently provide a well-defined system for creating an account, depositing funds, transferring funds, and withdrawing funds from an account.
However, investors in post office savings plans voiced concerns about the closing of the Account and the application for a duplicate passbook, particularly because there may be a distinct mode of holding.
The government’s explanation is significant since, in addition to a single holding account, one is permitted to keep Joint A and Joint B Type Accounts under the PO schemes. The clarification concerns the operation of Joint B Type Accounts under National Savings Schemes like NSC, SCSS, and others.
A Joint A-Type Account can be opened in the names of up to three adults and is payable to all of the account holders jointly or to the survivor or survivors, whereas a Joint B-Type Account can be opened in the names of up to three adults and is payable to any of the account holders or the survivor or survivors.
The Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, has stated that in the event of a Joint B Type account, any of the depositors or the surviving depositor may conduct any type of activity.
However, in the case of Non-CBS Post Offices and transfers to Branch Post Offices, the signatures of all depositors in a Joint Account, either A-type or B-type, must be acquired, since there is a requirement for the signatures of all depositors.
As a result, all account operations, including account closure, duplicate passbook issuance, and account transfer, shall be permitted to be carried out by either of the joint depositors or survivor in the case of a Joint B Type account in respect of all schemes except Senior Citizens’ Saving Scheme (SCSS) under National Savings Schemes.
In the case of SCSS, a person may create an account solely for himself or herself, or jointly with a spouse. The whole deposit in a joint account is only accountable to the first account holder. Both spouses can create a single account and joint accounts with each other, with a maximum deposit of Rs 15 lakh in each account, if they are both individually eligible to open the account.
Because the whole amount of deposit is attributed to the first account holder in the case of the SCSS Account, only quarterly interest withdrawals are permitted by either of the joint depositors or the survivor in the case of the Joint B Type account.
Regarding the remaining operations of the Joint B Type SCSS Account, either the first account holder may do all of the operations or the first account holder’s signature is required on all application forms for the account’s different operations.
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