The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has asked all recognised stock exchanges, including commodity derivatives exchanges as well as depositories to launch an online web-based complaints redressal system on the lines of SCORES.
SCORES is an online platform that Sebi launched way back in 2013 to help security market investors lodge complaints with it online against listed companies and Sebi-registered intermediaries. All complaints received by Sebi against these entities are dealt with through SCORES.
Sebi has now asked all exchanges and depositories to implement the grievance redressal mechanism within six months of the circular, i.e., on or before January 4, 2023.
Sebi has now issued the following guidelines to stock exchanges and depositories on implementing a grievance redressal system on lines of SCORES.
To begin with, the system should be Web-enabled and provide online access 24 x 7 with the following salient features:
All complaints, grievance redressal committee, arbitration, appellate arbitration, and reminders should be lodged online at any time from anywhere.
An email should be generated instantaneously acknowledging the receipt of the complaint by allotting a unique registration number for future reference and tracking.
The matter should be forwarded online to the entity (intermediary or listed company) concerned for redressal.
The entity concerned then has to indicate the mode i.e., online or offline for GRC and arbitration.
The access to the online system should be given to the trading members and depository participants.
The entity concerned will then upload an action taken report (ATR) on the complaints.
All recognized stock exchanges including commodity derivatives exchanges and/or depositories should peruse the ATR and dispose of the complaint if they are satisfied that the complaint has been adequately redressed.
The concerned investor can view the status of the complaint online.
The entity concerned and the concerned investor can seek and provide clarification(s) online to each other.
The complaints, GRC, arbitration, and appellate arbitration should have an audit trail.
All complaints, GRC, arbitration, appellate arbitration are saved in a central database that would generate relevant MIS reports to enable all recognised stock exchanges to take appropriate policy decisions and/or remedial actions.
Lastly, there should be a provision to link the online system with SCORES.
