New guidelines considered on bank charges

China's banking regulators are combing through commercial lenders' services and the relevant fees they charge with a view to setting out official guidelines to define each service item for which the public can be charged.

Two senior officials from China Banking Regulatory Commission — Guo Wuping, deputy director of the first branch of the supervision department, and Yin Long, deputy director of supervision on business innovation — said the commission is working with other ministries and nine lenders on the issue.

"Probably before next week, all technical work will be finished," they said, while attending an online interview with China Economic Net on Wednesday.

The officials said government pricing on banking services and the official guidance catalog over each chargeable item will be released together with the new regulatory rules on banks' service prices, which China released in February to solicit public opinion.

The groups involved in the move include the commission, the People's Bank of China and the National Development and Reform Commission.

The new rules drew a line between basic services that will be priced under government guidelines and those applying to market-based pricing. They require banks to price all the services they offer to clients in an open and clear way.

As for prices determined by the market, all decisions must be made at headquarters level rather than in branches, said the banking commission in a statement while releasing the rules.

Ni Hong, an official at the NDRC, said earlier that most of the services among banks will still be priced by the lenders themselves in accordance with market fluctuations. The official intervention on pricing aims only to guarantee citizens' rights to get access to basic banking services.

The new rules received more than 1,600 public submissions, according to Yin.