Government must remove restrictions on Withdrawals from Rupee Savings Accounts By Foreign Pensioners

August 02, 2024

56 Littles Road
Scarborough, ON
M1B 5C5, Canada.

Thiru K.S. Kugathasan MP
Trincomalee.

Dear Kugathasan,

Government must remove restrictions on Withdrawals from  Rupee Savings Accounts By  Foreign Pensioners

With effective from July 01, 2018 the then Government of Good Governance stopped paying pension to foreign pensioners through Sri Lankan foreign embassies/High Commission offices in dollars/sterling pounds. As a result, the Foreign Pension Department stopped paying foreign pensioners in foreign currency. Instead, the Department asked pensioners to open rupee savings accounts in one of the 3 local banks approved by the Pension department. 

The bank account should be an individual account and not a joint account. The monthly pension credited to the pensioners’ Bank Account cannot be withdrawn or transferred to a third party within Ceylon. Foreign Pensioners thought the move is to save dwindling foreign exchange, but they were proved wrong.  Now the BOC wants foreign pensioners to open a rupee savings account, but the procedure is cumbersome and costly.

The department of pension allows the transfer of the pension in dollars to the pensioner’s bank’s savings A/c in his/her country of residence. The limit is Rs. 1,000,000 once every 12 months. The transfer is a tedious process, filling many forms, countersigned by the Consular General, including identity via WhatsApp. There was a time when the BOC claimed it had no dollars to effect payment of pensions. 

The decision to stop payment of pensions to foreign pensioners in foreign currency makes no sense when the Government allows foreign pensioners to convert the rupees into dollars to be credited to their foreign Bank Savings A/c. It is like bringing your hand behind your head to touch your nose!   If the purpose is to save foreign exchange, then such purpose is defeated.

It is unethical on the part of the government to impose stringent conditions on how a pensioner should spend his/her pension money which is rightly his/her.

I suggest the government permits foreign pensioners to use the pension amount credited to their local bank accounts in rupees to help relatives/friends/charities. Many pensioners will be willing to do that. 

On a personal note, when my relatives back home are facing economic hardship, I would like to use my pension funds to help them.  I am sure other foreign pensioners will be willing to do likewise.

I wish you take this issue with the government to do away with the irrational and cumbersome practice of paying foreign pensioners in rupees and later allowing those rupees to be converted to dollars. Since, foreign exchange is the problem, rightly so, then it makes sense to permit foreign pensioners to use the rupees in their local banks and spend the same locally.

I have chosen to address this email to you since M.A. Sumanthiran, MP, late R. Sampanthan MP, Shanakiyan MP showed no interest in doing justice to foreign pensioners, a majority of them Tamils. Many foreign pensioners have stopped drawing their pensions.

I am appealing to you to take this matter with the Hon. Minister of Public Administration to review the current policy and reverse the ban on transferring/withdrawing rupees by Foreign Pensioners from their local bank accounts. Thank You.

Thanking you.

Yours sincerely

Veluppillai Thangavelu