Chennai: Cheque lost in transit, bank told to pay Rs 17L

CHENNAI: The Chennai North District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission directed an international private bank to pay Rs 17 lakh as compensation to a customer – a staff of the same bank – after a courier company lost a bounced cheque in transit.

The complainant, L Dinesh Kumar, works as a senior analyst at the Standard Chartered Bank for the past six years. According to him, a cheque that he received from a third party bounced due to insufficient funds, and the bank sent the cheque to his address through DTDC Express.

The bank said it was delivered in February 2024. As he did not receive it, Dinesh complained to the bank and the courier firm. Later, when he went to the DTDC office to verify, the staff admitted that the cheque was lost and untraceable.

Dinesh then approached the bank and initiated the complaint. On the basis of this, a DTDC official called and confirmed that they would compensate for the loss in transit and Dinesh shared the required documents as asked by the official.

Later, however, DTDC claimed that the cheque was already delivered and claimed it had signed proof.

According to Dinesh, the signature on the courier acknowledgement is forged. After losing the dishonoured cheque, he faced a huge financial crisis but could not file a legal case against the drawer.

When the matter came before it, the commission headed by president D Gopinath, and members Kavitha Kannan and V Ramamurthy dismissed the complaint against DTDC, noting, “It is the responsibility of the bank to take action against the DTDC for the alleged non-delivery of the post. And the bank alone is liable for failure to return the dishonoured cheque to Dinesh and deficiency in banking service.”

The forum then directed the bank to pay the dishonoured cheque amount – Rs 17 lakh – as compensation towards deficiency in service, mental agony, pain and suffering, and added Rs 5,000 towards litigation cost.