in Education, India

Be careful while operating ATM machine : A True incidence

This post has been written specifically to educate people of another kind of fraud at the ATMs.

The story narrated below is a real incident that happened today.

A sixty years old year man, living in a small town, visits a neighborhood ATM early morning to withdraw some cash. Like always, he inserts his debit card, enters PIN and requests for cash withdrawal. As machine does not have enough currency notes, machine informs that amount entered is large and requests him to choose a smaller amount. He tries 2-3 times and is able to only withdraw 2-3000. Now the old man is confused what to do.

At this moment, a young man who was standing in ATM cabin, comes closer and offers help with operating machine. Since the old man is not very comfortable with new-age technologies like ATMs etc, he agrees to take help from this young man. Young man takes his card and moves to operate ATM.

Now the awe begins! To old man’s surprise, young man too had a similar debit card. He immediately sensed something was wrong and snatched both the cards from young man and asked him what was he doing. Now the young man was red faced and he immediately ran out of the ATM.

Now the question is “what the young man was trying to do“.

He was sneaking behind the old man, trying to see what PIN is he entering which he managed to find out. His intention was to withdraw the desired cash for the old man and give him the other card so that he can misuse his card later, of which he now knows the PIN.

It was good presence of mind from the old man to smell foul and take quick action, otherwise he could have lost some part of his hard earned or retirement money.

In this case he was not very much interested to inform the matter to bank manager, as he felt that it may involve police and he did want to take pain of visiting police station (not forgetting the cooperative and supportive police departments we have in world’s largest democracy!).

Lessons learnt from this story:

  1. Never allow any other person to enter or stand behind/next to you in an ATM while you are operating it.
  2. Only visit an ATM when it has a security guard sitting at the gate.
  3. Unless needed specifically, keep daily withdrawal limit from debit card to a lower amount. As in case somebody steals your card, you will not lose much in a day.
  4. Always keep mobile transaction alerts activated on your mobile, even if it comes at some cost.
  5. Never take help from any unknown person. If you are in doubt, ask bank employees for help if ATM is inside branch or read the instructions carefully.
  6. Never disclose your PIN with to anyone, yes just ANYONE.
  7. Make sure you visit a well maintained ATM which has proper camera installed. The camera is usually on top of the machine, at height of your head/shoulder.
  8. If something such undesirable bad incidences happens, always change your PIN immediately and inform the matter to bank manger.

Please remember since you had you 10th mark sheet or license or first bank account, you are being/can be watched by everyone from our government to FBI and CIA!

Please remember your security and well being is your priority and for that you have to be watchful towards your environment. The old man in this story called me to tell about this incident in the evening.

He is my Father.

Facebook Comments

Write a Comment

Comment

22 Comments

  1. Thanks Pankaj.

    This is good to know.Usually we neglet all this imp things in our life and keep blaming to our luck.

    Thanks once again and definately i will circulate this among others.

  2. sir,
    how is bharti axa life ajjevan anand policy
    one person from bajaj capital compelled me to put 44000/-per year inbharti axa life ajjevan anand policy.tell me sir is it good or not .so that i can stop/withdraw this immediately.my age is 45.working in psu
    2. policy issue date is may 25/5/2011(joining date)and policy premium receipt is from for the period of april 01/2010 to june 2011. is it correct .before joining how they took premium .pls give me your good advise.thank u
    jomy

    • @Jomy
      Please withdraw policy and get term insurance instead if you want insurance coverage. For future returns, invest into diversified mutual funds or PPF.
      As policy issue date is 25th May, Its under free lookup period as of now. You may return it back with non-acceptance.
      I am not sure if policy is starting from May 2011, how you can pay for Jan 2010-June 2011. Something is wrong somewhere.

  3. I have been investing in Reliance SIP called Small Cap. The NAVs are certainly not doing well from its very beginning.. Now I am not sure whether i shall continue it or withdraw it after paying the exit load. Please advice..

    • @R Dtt
      Small cap funds arein high risk category. Markets have not been doing pretty well since last 8-10 months.
      If you want some safety, I would advise you to exit this fund and switch to equity diversified funds with large cap investments.

  4. Hello Pankaj, Its nice to see you leaving your job and taking personal finance full time which may help us in our personal finance queries. We all hope that you would give us much more time to solve our personal finance queries…..Can we know are you taking this venture full time and what are your plans to help all of us

  5. Hi First of all thank you for the income tax calculator, its a great help to community,

    I am an IT professional and single source of income holder, lastyear i joined one MNC which paid me 1,00,000/ INR of Joining Bonus, but i had to left that company by 1 month and as per agreement i had to pay back the Joining Bonus amount if i leave in one year, so i paid back, now the question is that Organization deducted flat 10% of income tax on the joining bonus that is 10k, and as a matter of fact i have never used that money and pay back to company next month in full 1,00,000/- INR, so is there any way to claim the tax that i paid. please let mek now the process of the same also, wil be a great help.

    Thanks,
    Bharat.

  6. Good Morning Sir. The government value of my commercial property is Rs. 45,56,000 and it is 12 years old. Now I am planning to sell it and the buyer is claiming 20% depreciation on the government value, amounting to Rs. 9,11,000 and paying the stamp duty on Rs. 36,45,000 and this is the amount it will be shown on the Sale Deed and also paid to me through Bank transfer or DD.

    The value of the property after calculating CII is now: Rs. 12,21,000. Therefore, Sale Proceeds Rs. 36,45,000 minus CII Value Rs. 12,21,000 = Rs. 24,24,000 and I should pay 20% Capital Gain Tax on this amounting to Rs. 4,84,800. When do I have to pay this Tax? The registration may take place on 20 June 2013. Do I have to pay any advance Cap Gains tax, if so, when? Do I have to pay in cash or Cheque or DD to IT Dept.?

    Can I claim depreciation on the Cap Gain Tax as the property is now 12 years old?

    After paying the CG Tax, am I entitled to use all the sale proceeds as per my will and wish?

    Kindly help me by giving your valuable solutions to minimize my CG Tax amount? Thanks and Regards

    • @VSB Rao
      You will have to pay tax fully by 31st March, 2014. 30% of this tax should be paid by Sept 15 and 60% by Dec 15.
      You can pay using online tax payment challan or may visit bank to pay taxes.

      There is no depreciation available on capital gain tax.

      After paying 20% tax on gains, you are free to use amount wherever you want.

      One can only save tax either by investing into residential house property u/s 54F (only in case you won’t own more than one already) or investing into capital gain bonds u/s 54EC.

      You can partially invest into 54F/54EC and pay tax on remaining unused sale consideration in proportion.

      • Thank you very much for your kind assistance. Would be kind enough to confirm that my above calculations are correct ?

        Thanks once again for the great assistance you are providing to a common man/woman. Regards.

        • @VSB Rao
          Your computations are fine.
          Only issue what may arise is Govt value of property. Stamp duty is also levied on Govt value and gains are also computed on basis of that.

  7. Sorry, I forgot to mention in my above query that since it is the commercial property, I knew that I can invest on any residential property and I do not wish to block my money for 3 years by investing the whole sale proceeds in CG Bonds. If you have any other ways and means to save the CG Tax pls suggest.

    Is it possible to invest partial amount in CG Bonds and pay CG Tax on the rest of the amount? Pls help me in suggesting a best and legal way. Thanks and Regards.

  8. Pls read the 2nd line of my above query as:

    //
    the commercial property, I knew that I can NOT invest on any//

    sorry for the inconvenience..Regards