Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank might soon appear in a whole series of scandalous court trials: the bank will probably be sued by its own customers.

On October 14, 2008, the bank imposed a 20% fee on private customers who want to cash their deposits in before the end of the deposit period. The fee is imposed on private individuals who want to withdraw more than 50,000 RUR.

The bank claims this has been done in order to avoid the panic that started to spread among the customers. As a result, all the depositors who wanted to get their money back before the end of the deposit period had to either give up on their guaranteed right to getting the cash at any given moment or pay the 20% commission. For many of them, this ban has already caused financial problems and failed transactions.

UralBusinessConsulting Agency of Information and Analytics received a message from one unhappy customer who kept about 3 million RUR at Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank. He needed the money to buy an apartment and made a reservation for October 15, 2008 as early as two days in advance. Nevertheless, his application was turned down on October 15, 2008, and the customer was offered to pay the 20% commission, that is, about 600,000 RUR.

Even though the unfortunate customer insisted on getting the sum in full, kept explaining his application had nothing to do with the recent panic, and made it clear that the money was needed to go through with a long-awaited transaction, the bank refused to give him his money back. At the end of the day, the customer was unable to buy the apartment he had planned to.

The man is now planning to use all his potential to get the full deposit sum without any illegal provisos not stated in the bank-customer agreement. For one, he is going to appeal to the media, the Central Bank, and the public prosecution authorities, and to lay a claim against Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank and take it to court.

Quite a few other angry customers might actually follow suit.