Banks on Monday decided to waive the service charge on remittance to boost inflow of money sent by expatriate Bangladeshis.
They will also keep their overseas exchanges open during holidays so that migrant workers can remit money smoothly.
The decision was taken at a meeting between the Bangladesh Foreign Exchange Dealers' Association (Bafeda) and the Association of Bankers, Bangladesh (ABB) at the Sonali Bank's head office in the capital.
Md Afzal Karim, chairman of the Bafeda, an organization that implements forex related policies, announced the decisions at a media briefing after the meeting.
Banks usually impose service charges between $1 and $2 on remitters.
But from now on, such a service charge will not be imposed in order to encourage expatriates to send remittance through the banking channel, said Karim.
On top of that, expatriates can visit exchanges of local banks during holidays as the outlets will remain open on those days, said Karim, also the managing director of Sonali Bank.
The moves come as banks in Bangladesh are facing an acute shortage of US dollars because of higher import payments against lower exports and remittance receipts.
Remittances declined 7.4% year-on-year to $1.52 billion in October and fell 2.03% to $7.19 billion in the first four months of the current fiscal year.
As a result, the country's foreign exchange reserves stood at $35.73 billion on November 2, down 23% from a year earlier.
The Bafeda and the ABB also refixed the exchange rate for exporters yesterday.
Under the new rate, exporters will get Tk100 for each US dollar, compared to Tk99.50 now.
Importers will have to buy the greenback based on the weighted average exchange rate plus Tk 1.
The average rate will be decided based on the rates paid to exporters and money exchanges.