SBI waives SMS charges on mobile fund transfers

India's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) has announced a waiver of SMS charges on mobile fund transfers. SBI informed that by using USSD services, users can now easily transact without any additional charges.
SBI has shared this information on social media. SBI wrote in the post, 'SMS charges on mobile fund transfer now waived! Users can now easily transact without any additional charges.
The post further states that users can avail of the services at no extra charge. Including sending money, requesting money, account balance, mini statement and changing UPI PIN.
USSD or Unstructured Supplementary Service data is commonly used for checking talk time balance or account information and for mobile banking transactions. This service works on feature phones. SBI's decision will benefit feature phone users, who account for more than 65% of the country's more than 1 billion mobile phone users. Feature phone users can use this service by dialling *99#.
According to other news, SBI has increased the benchmark prime lending rate by 70 basis points. After this hike, as per the information posted on SBI's website, the revised rate is now 13.45%. The new rates have come into effect from 15 September. The bank has also increased the base rate by the same basic point to 8.7%, with effect from today.
The EMI amount of borrowers taking loans at the base rate will increase. The bank revises both the BPLR and the Base Rate on a quarterly basis. In the coming days, other banks can also revise the lending rate SBI.