For the benefit of retail investors to invest in IPO’s and also to encourage holding of Demat accounts, the SEBI Board has taken a decision that all Depository Participants (DPs) shall make available a “Basic Service Demat Account(BSDA)” facility with limited services. It is also aimed at reducing the cost of maintaining securities in Demat accounts for the retail individual investors.
The main features of BSDA Scheme are as follows:
» Will be effective from 01-10-2012.
» Eligibility: All the individuals who have or propose to have only one Demat account where they are the sole or first holder are eligible which means an Individual can have only one BSDA account across all Depositories. However, BSDA holder can have General Demat account jointly with other holder where he/she is not the First holder. The value of securities held in the BSDA account should not exceed Rs 2,00,000/- at any point of time. The value of the holding is determined on the basis of the daily closing price or NAV of the securities or units of mutual funds, as the case may be. Where such price is not available, the last traded price will be taken in to account and for unlisted securities other than the mutual funds, face value will be taken in to account. If value of holding exceeds the prescribed criteria at any given date, the DP’s may levy charges as applicable to General Demat accounts. Already existing Beneficiary Owners (BO’s) are also eligible if they fulfill the above conditions. They will be given an option to convert their normal Demat account into BSDA on the date of next Billing cycle. Further to the above, a declaration has to be obtained from the investor who wishes to open a BSDA/convert existing Demat account to BSDA stating that the first holder/sole holder does not and will not have any other Demat account where he/she is the first holder/sole holder across all depositories. (format of declaration given below)
» Services to Basic Service Demat Accounts:
a. Statement of accounts – Transaction statements will be sent to the BO at the end of each quarter. If there are no transactions in any quarter, no transaction statement will be sent. If the account balance is nil, no further quarterly statements will be sent.
b. One annual statement of holding will be sent in respect of the accounts with no transaction & nil balance.
» Charges: No AMC shall be levied, if the value of holding is up to Rs 50,000/- and Rs 100/-(maximum) will be charged if the value of holding is between Rs 50,000/- to 200,000/-. TWO physical transaction statements will be provided free of cost during ONE financial year. Additional physical transaction statements will be charged at Rs 25/- per statement.
» It is mandatory that all BOs opting for the facility of BSDA need to register their Mobile Number for availing the SMS alert facility for debit transactions.
» Minimum two delivery instruction slips(DIS) will be issued at the time of account opening.
» All other terms & conditions as applicable to regular Demat accounts, other than the ones mentioned here in above shall continue to apply to BSDA.
