SBI plans 1.5 lakh POS terminals next fiscal

In a bid to expand its fee-based income, country's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) is planning to place about 1.50 lakh point of sale (POS) terminals for debit and credit card payments across the country in the next fiscal.

"The present EoI (expressions of interest) is for the purchase of around 1.35-1.50 lakh POS terminals across the country during the first year of operations or 2010-11 and also for the managed services during the warranty period or the first year of deployment," SBI said in its Request For Proposal (RFP).

The last date for submission of bids is January 25, it said, adding, it plans to deploy six lakh POS terminals in the first five years of its operations.

Last year, the bank had floated RFP for selection of ioint venture (JV) partner for merchant acquiring business and the selection process is at an advanced stage.

The merchant acquiring business would be carried out through a wholly-owned subsidiary, which would include acquiring bank identification numbers (BINs) from the schemes, as well managing services for POS terminals among others.

The managed services would include deployment of POS terminals at customer location, their replacement, merchant training and maintenance among others.

The business penetration of the new line of operation is envisaged on a pan-India scale, with metro, urban, semi-urban and rural centres, it said.

The State Bank Group currently has over 18,000 ATMs across the country and has issued over 60 million debit cards.

The bank has plans to acquire the POS terminals on an outright purchase basis. However, the bank is also evaluating other options like leasing the terminals in the form of asset return or non-return and periodical rentals.