KUALA LUMPUR: After 20 months of waiver, banks and financial institutions will reimpose the RM1 Malaysian Electronic Payment System (MEPS) Interbank ATM withdrawal fee effective Feb 1, 2022.
Although Bank Negara Malaysia has yet to make an official announcement about the reinstatement, banks have started putting up the announcement on their websites and social media platforms, since yesterday.
Maybank, Hong Leong, Public Bank, Bank Islam, CIMB are among the banks who have confirmed the announcement.
On April 6, 2020, in light of the Movement Control Order (MCO) restrictions due to Covid-19, the government decided that banks would waive the RM1 fee for withdrawal transactions carried out at different banks.
Then Senior Minister of Defence, Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob had said the move was to reduce Covid-19 infection risks and to limit any travel needs above the permitted 10km radius while under the MCO.
This was said to have helped reduce movement and possible congestion at the ATM centres during the early phase of the MCO.
Later, when the country transitioned into the Conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO), Ismail Sabri again announced that the decision would stay until the MCO was effectively lifted.
The waiver was supposed to be reinstated in August when the country progressively transitioned into the National Recovery Plan (NRP) but no official announcement has been made since.
