The country’s national bank, Bank of Maldives will be providing essential services on Monday and Wednesday.

The reveal was made via a statement by the bank on Thursday, as such, the bank will provide essential services from 09:30am to 12:00pm on 4 and 6 May.

Although the bank’s branches and service centers remain closed due to the lockdown declared by the government, essential services have been made available. This was done as safeguarding the health of customers remains the highest priority of the bank.

The services that have been made available are international transfers, payroll processing, cheque processing for ATM cheques and local bank transfers.

The statement reads that customers are required to fill out ande-maila TT application form with the relevant supporting documents such as the invoice, to the bank or submit a request for TT through internet banking. Applications that are received by 11am will be processed the same day.

In addition, payroll requests will be accepted via e-mail as well and details of the required documents have been made available on the bank’swebsite. Applications that are received by 11am will be processed the same day.

Cheque processing for ATM cheques will also be provided, as such, all clearing cheques deposited to ATMs will be sent for clearing the next day and cheques deposited before 11:30am will be processed the same day.

Further, ACH requests received through internet banking by 10am will also be processed the same day for local bank transfers while transfers above MVR 100,000 that are requested through internet banking by 11:30am will be processed the same day as well along with MRTGS requests received by the same time.

The statement goes on to read that cash services have been halted at branches and only the customers authorized to do so can continue to use ATM services. The daily deposit limit is MVR 200,000 for businesses and MVR 50,000 for individuals.

BML urged customers to access banking services online during the lockdown period, which was extended to an additional 14 days which will expire on 14 May.