Dubai: Money transfer operators in UAE have been inundated with requests to exchange demonetised rupee notes since the Indian government decided to take action against illegal cash hoarders.
Authorities imposed an overnight ban on old 500 and 1,000 bills on November 8, creating chaos at ATMs and banks in India. The move is reportedly intended to weed out black money.
Indians working in the UAE who also have some stash of old bills in their homes are walking into exchange outlets with amounts ranging between 500 and 25,000 rupees (Dh1,300), only to be turned down at the counters.
“The demonetisation of 1,000 and 500 Indian rupees have created a panic. Customers visiting us on our counters are coming with amounts as small as 500 and we have seen cases of amounts as large a 20,000,” Rajiv Raipancholia, secretary of Foreign Exchange and Remittance Group (FERG) in UAE, told Gulf News.
Raipancholia said Indians share a common habit of storing physical cash at home, but he clarified he has not seen cases of expatriates hoarding huge stockpiles of cash.
“We have not noticed anyone bringing demonetized bills in sack loads. But it is quite normal for every Indian expatriate to maintain some amount of rupees in their residence as the same will be used for their travel to India whenever they go,” he added.
Cash hoarders, however, are being advised to stay calm, as the scrapped bills can still be exchanged in their home country until the end of the year. Exchange outlets in Dubai, on the other hand, are not authorised to accept the old bills.
“[The demonetised currency notes] continue to be legal tenders and expatriates have time until 31st December 2016 to exchange the same in India,” Raipancholia added.
Another major money transfer operator, UAE Exchange, which runs 150 outlets across the country, said they are also seeing a huge number of Indian expatriates trying to hand over the old bills.
“But currently, we are not [accepting them]. We’d like to reassure our customers that we are closely monitoring the situation and are standing by to make necessary arrangements as and when notified by [Indian authorities] for handling such currency notes outside India,” said Promoth Manghat, chief executive officer of UAE Exchange Group.
“None of the exchange houses are allowed to accept the demonetised Indian currency notes. We, too, at UAE Exchange, adhere to strict regulations by the regulatory bodies and none of our branches across the country are accepting the [old currencies],” Manghat pointed out.
