Small and medium-sized banks are gradually clearing "dormant accounts," which may become a regular mechanism.

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Reporter: Peng Yan

Since March, many small and medium-sized banks have intensively issued announcements to carry out centralized regulation and cleaning of inefficient accounts with no transactions for a long time, low balances, or inconsistent identity information. At the same time, many institutions have clearly stated that they will establish an annual routine cleaning mechanism, shifting bank account management from temporary special rectification to long-term control.

Yang Haiping, a researcher at the Shanghai Institute of Finance and Law, told the Securities Daily that the concentrated cleaning of “sleeping accounts” by small and medium-sized banks is mainly based on three considerations: first, strictly implementing the relevant requirements of regulatory authorities; second, strengthening risk prevention and control, as long-term inactive accounts are prone to being misused or stolen and can become tools for telecom fraud, money laundering, and other illegal activities; the cleaning work can effectively protect customer fund safety; third, responding to the demand for refined management, reducing the system and manpower costs occupied by ineffective accounts, and optimizing the customer management system.

Cleaning work will enter a routine phase

The reporter has found that the scope of this cleaning covers personal and corporate bank settlement accounts, primarily based on the criteria of “long-term no active transactions” and “low balance.” At the same time, accounts with expired documents, non-real-name registration, multiple accounts for one person, and other information anomalies are included in the cleaning scope. Unlike previous short-term special actions, the “establishment of an annual routine mechanism” has become a prominent feature of this round of cleaning work, and many banks have clarified their subsequent routine execution arrangements.

Specifically, on March 19, Hejiang Rural Commercial Bank issued an announcement regarding the cleaning of personal bank settlement accounts, stating that accounts held by one person in multiple banks will be cleaned; accounts whose phone numbers do not correspond one-to-one with the ID card numbers will also be cleaned. The bank will start cleaning accounts that meet the cleaning conditions on June 30, 2026, and will continue to clean eligible accounts every year thereafter.

Pinghe Rural Commercial Bank clarified the definition standards for inefficient corporate settlement accounts in an announcement on March 14: from March 1, 2025, to February 28, 2026, any corporate settlement accounts that have not actively initiated any payment or receipt business and do not owe any debts to the bank will fall under the cleaning scope. The announcement shows that the first round of cleaning will be executed in April 2026, with subsequent cleaning carried out annually.

Qinghai Bank recently issued an announcement clearly defining the cleaning standards for long-term inactive personal accounts: as of March 30, 2026, any personal bank settlement accounts that have not actively conducted deposit, withdrawal, transfer, or other transaction activities for two consecutive years or more, with a balance of 50 yuan or less, and no binding repayment relationships for credit cards, loan repayments, large fixed deposits, wealth management, or ETC (except for social security card accounts) will be included in the cleaning. The bank stated that after completing the first round of cleaning on March 31, 2026, it will regularly standardize eligible accounts every year.

In addition, many small and medium-sized banks, including Gushi Tianjiao Village Bank and Panzhihua Rural Commercial Bank, are synchronously following up to carry out centralized regulation and cleaning work. Among them, many banks have made it clear that they will implement annual routine cleaning, building a new model of account management combining “centralized rectification + long-term management.”

Contributes to cost reduction and efficiency enhancement

“The recent intensive cleaning action of ‘sleeping accounts’ by small and medium-sized banks is both a compliance measure under regulatory guidance in the financial industry and a proactive adjustment by small and medium-sized banks in response to operational pressures,” said Xue Hongyan, a special researcher at Suzhou Bank, to the Securities Daily.

From a regulatory perspective, small and medium-sized banks have become the focus of regulatory attention due to shortcomings in account management, such as lagging customer information updates and relatively insufficient identity verification technology. Analyzing from an operational perspective, small and medium-sized banks are currently facing challenges such as narrowing net interest margins and pressure on profitability. Long-term inactive accounts continuously occupy system resources and manpower costs; cleaning “sleeping accounts” helps optimize account structure and achieve cost reduction and efficiency enhancement.

Xue Hongyan believes that for the banks themselves, this move can reduce ineffective resource occupation and lower operating costs, allowing the saved resources to be used to optimize products and services, strengthen lifecycle management of accounts, and improve risk control levels. At the industry level, this move can also promote the sharing of account information and collaborative regulation among financial institutions, helping to build a more complete financial security line.

Looking ahead to the subsequent routine cleaning work, Xue Hongyan suggests that banks should establish a layered and classified management mechanism, formulating differentiated cleaning strategies based on account dormancy time, balance situation, risk level, etc., while optimizing the customer notification process to fully protect the financial consumers’ right to know. Additionally, they should enhance identity verification and risk identification capabilities through technology upgrades, making the cleaning work more efficient and precise.

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Editor: Gao Jia