Sri Lanka banking sector cheque returns value has surpassed Rs. 250 billion in 2023 with over 1 million cheques bouncing back, Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) data said.

According to the payment bulletin for Q4 of 2023 by CBSL, 1.02 million cheques have returned in 2023, 20% increase year on year, with a total value of Rs. 262.4 billion compared to Rs. 212 billion in crisis year 2022.

About 48% of the cheques were returned without proper funds to pay for the cheque in the drawer account while in 21% payments were stopped by the drawer and 12% account closed.

Around 3% cheques were returned out of the cheques that were received for clearing daily in 2023 with the average value of cheque returns per day stood at Rs. 1.09 billion.

Further, active credit cards in use dropped by 3.3% year on year in 2023, as the total credit cards in use fell below 2 million after 2020, to 1.98 million.

However, the credit card transactions volume and value increased by 37.6% and 42.7% in 2023 compared to 2022. The transaction value stood at Rs. 573.4 billion in 2023.

Also, the defaulted number of credit cards dropped by 15.5% in 2023 compared to 2022, with a default transaction value of Rs 20.6 billion.