City hospitals tie up with banks to ease patients’ cash crunch

Leading hospitals in the Capital such as Sir Ganga Ram Hospital (SRGH) and Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital have tied up with banks and post offices to set up extra counters and collect filled application forms to ease the process of exchanging demonetised Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes.

As part of the initiative, private hospitals have also installed dozens of card-swapping machines as patients take to electronic payment as the only option available. The centrally-located SRGH has tied up with the Syndicate Bank and set up three new counters, apart from the existing ones, to reduce the long queues and wait for the exchange of old currency by the patients. 

“We have given three extra counters and extra security guards for depositing of cash by employees, doctors, patients and their attendants,” D S Rana, Chairman (Board of Management) at SRGH, said. According to Rana, in June, 2015 after a call by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for digitisation of payment and official records, SRGH has started e-health cards, being issued to a large chunk of patients, emerging out to be highly beneficial in such a crisis situation in terms of payment.

“This card enables patients to transfer any amount from their (patients) banks to their health cards, which can be used anywhere inside the hospital,” said Rana. He further said: “In the OPDs also, five new card-swapping machines have been installed.”