Sebi to outsource processing of investor complaints

Faced with the Herculean task of handling lakhs of investor complaints, market regulator Sebi plans to rope in third party agencies for processing and maintenance of these grievances.

The decision to outsource processing and maintenance of investor grievances has been taken by Sebi to help it resolve these complaints on a fast-track basis, a senior official said.

Incidentally, Sebi is currently in the process of finalising a set of regulations for outsourcing of work by various market intermediaries such as brokers, mutual funds and investment bankers. The regulator is said to be against outsourcing of the market entities' core and investor-sensitive acticities.

Sebi has decided to put in place stringent conditions for selection of the agency to be empaneled by it for handling the investor complaints and due care would be taken to safeguard the investors' interest, the official added.