How to activate a dormant, inactive NRI account

It is possible that the bank won’t permit any transactions in your savings account if the account was opened but not accessed for a prolonged period of time or if the account has been inactive for longer than 12 months. Depending on the account status, banks mark such accounts as dormant or inactive. As it’s likely that you’re not keeping an eye on your account, this is a precaution to protect your interests.

What are inactive and dormant accounts?
According to the ICICI Bank website, here is when the bank will flag an account as inactive or dormant.
Inactive Account: If you do not do any transactions through your savings account for more than 12 months, the account will be classified as “inactive”.

Dormant account: If you do not do any transactions through your savings account for more than 24 months, the account will be classified as “dormant”.

How to activate the dormant account
The process to activate the dormant or inactive account varies with each bank.

Kotak Mahindra Bank
According to the Kotak Mahindra Bank website, “As an NRI customer, you can activate your dormant NRE account by sending a mail to [email protected], from your preferred email address that is updated in the bank records. You need to attach a dormancy removal request along with your identity, signature, and address proof in the mail. You can download the request letter from the bank’s website.

Note: Dormant accounts are converted into inactive accounts, so you will need to initiate a debit/ credit transaction to have your NRE account fully activated, according to the bank’s website.

ICICI Bank
Inactive Account Activation: You can activate your inactive account in the following ways:

• Withdraw or deposit money in your account through a cheque or ATM
• Transfer funds into the account through Money2India.com
• By paying bills from that inactive account

Dormant Account Activation
ICICI Bank NRI customers can use any of the following channels to restore their account from the dormant state

• You have to send an account-activation request to ICICI Bank Limited, RPC Mumbai, Autumn Estate, 5th Floor, ‘A’ Wing, Near Mhada, Chandivali, Andheri (E), Mumbai – 400 072. INDIA.
• You can also log into www.icicibank.com and place a request to activate your dormant account through the “service request” option. Your internet banking option must be active to initiate this request
• You can also call the bank at +91 40 23128925, if you are currently residing abroad or in India.

SBI Bank
State Bank of India (SBI) in a tweet to its customer stated, “ You may operationalise your inoperative NRI account with us by submitting a re-KYC letter along with identification documents and a mandate to the branch for carrying out Rs 1/- debit & credit in the customer’s account (included in the specimen of the re-KYC letter). You may download the “For operationalizing In-operative NRE / NRO account form at http://bit.ly/SBI-NRI-Form”

Restriction on Inactive and Dormant accounts
If your account is in an inactive or dormant state, you will not one allowed to do certain transactions depending on the status of the account. As per the ICICI Bank website, here are the restriction;

Inactive Account restriction: If your account becomes inactive, we will not be able to process the following requests :

• Request for deliverables like debit card, Cheque Book, intenet banking user ID/password
• No other requests or services will be denied in case your account is inactive

Dormant Account restrictions: If your account becomes Dormant, you will not be able to place a request for:

• Issuance of chequebook/ deliverables
• Renewal of ATM/ Debit Card
• Requests for change of address, contact number, email address
• Transactions through ATMs, internet banking, and phone banking