Special Institutions Account

What kind of institution holds the money: a scheduled commercial bank, a small finance bank, a co-operative bank or an NBFC. It decides which RBI rules apply and, critically, whether deposit insurance covers you at all.

The single most material fact about a deposit and the one most often buried. DICGC insurance covers up to ₹5 lakh per depositor per bank, across all your accounts at that bank combined, not per account.

How many branches the institution operates. It matters for cash handling and for anything a digital channel cannot resolve.

How often interest is paid out rather than reinvested. A payout option gives regular income but forgoes compounding, so it yields less overall than a cumulative deposit at the same rate.

How the institution determines and revises the rate, and whether it is fixed for the term. The rate itself moves and lives in the service; this records the mechanism, which does not.

The average balance the account must hold to avoid a penalty. Most banks calculate it as a monthly or quarterly average, so a single low day is not necessarily a breach, and the shortfall penalty is usually proportional.

Whether surplus balance moves automatically into a fixed deposit and back when needed. It earns deposit rates on idle money without locking it up, though breaking the sweep may carry the usual premature penalty.

Whether a nominee can be registered digitally. Registering one is what spares a family a lengthy claim process later.

Whether the product can be opened entirely online without a branch visit.

Whether a cheque book is issued free, and how many leaves. Still needed for some deposits, rental agreements and loan mandates.

What outward transfers cost. NEFT and RTGS through digital channels are free by RBI direction for savings accounts; IMPS and branch-initiated transfers may still carry a fee.

How many free ATM transactions the bank's own machines allow each month. RBI sets a floor; banks often give more at their own ATMs than at others.

How many free transactions are allowed at other banks' ATMs each month. This is the limit most people actually hit, and the count usually includes balance enquiries.

What each ATM transaction costs once the free ones are used up, before GST.

A link to the bank's official schedule of charges, the authoritative source for every fee recorded here.

Which version of the schedule of charges these facts were read from. Banks revise fees with notice, so this records which document was in front of us.