Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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294. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the cost to his Department of negative interest rates on deposits held; the details of same for agencies under his aegis; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11741/18]

Charles Flanagan (Laois, Fine Gael)
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I wish to inform the Deputy that negative interest costs incurred by my Department and Agencies under the remit of my Department's Vote (Vote 24) amounted to €22,320.19, for the year ended 31st December 2017.

This banking cost arose for the most part in relation to the payment and receipt processing operations of the Justice Financial Shared Services Centre, which provides financial shared services to the Justice sector and a number of other Government Departments and bodies.  These charges arise where the bank requires to be put in funds before outward customer and other payments can be processed or where there are incoming receipts above a certain level which require further processing.