The Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission has so far addressed over 94 per cent of the complaints lodged by stock investors online since the introduction of an online complaint module. On September 30 last year, the BSEC introduced the separate window — Customer Complaints Address Module (CCAM) — with the aim of expediting redress for the investors’ complaints. Since its inception, a total of 233 complaints were lodged by investors on the digital platform, according to the BSEC data. Of them, 94.5 per cent or 219 complaints were addressed, and the stock market regulator is in the process of settling the other 14 complaints. The average period of settlement for each complaint was 14 days, which was much faster than before. It used to take three to four months, even more in some cases, to resolve complaints after being filed. BSEC officials said that the physical process was of course slower as documents were submitted by hand and courier. They said that after introduction of CCAM, the amount of manual submission of complaints declined significantly as investors found online system beneficial. The new system eased the delivery system of solutions and was more transparent and swift, they said. The complaints filed through the CCAM were mostly about non-payment of cash dividend, non-disbursement of stock dividend, non-payment of sale proceeds, un-authorised sales of shares, delay in settlement of share transactions, margin loans and forced selling. After the introduction of the CCAM, investors submitted one compliant in September, 82 complaints in October, 56 in November, 27 in December, 19 in January this year, 23 in February, 21 in March and one in April. Of the 23 complaints submitted in February, 19 were addressed and of the 21 complaints submitted in March, 14 were addressed. The complaints which were lodged in five months before February were addressed timely. The securities regulator has included in their CCAM all the stakeholders who deal with the customers. After submission, the authority concerned automati cally receives the complaint. An investor has to enter the CCAM window, which is available on the home page of the BSEC web site, by using BO account, cell phone number and e-mail address. The investors must include accurate bank account, mobile number and e-mail address used in the form of BO (beneficiary owners’) accounts. Investors are provided a complaint ID and be able to check the status of complaints anytime. One who is unsatisfied with the response is allowed to file appeal with the regulator.
