Sir your credit card has been refused…
One big PSU bank – which has been actively wooing me to open an account- called me and offered me a credit card. Here is the story. No exaggeration. Please believe me, it is the absolute truth. I anyway did not want the card, so can laugh at it, but if somebody wanted a card this would have been a nightmare.
Scene I Act I:
Bank: Sir you have been selected to be issued a credit card with a Rs. 4 lakh limit.
Me: Fine. Tell me what to do
Bank: Sir our man will come at 4pm and collect: your pan card copy, pay slip, one photo, filled in form, visiting card….
Me: Sure.
The representative came at the said time….and collected everything.
Bank: Sir you have not given an address proof, so we need a letter from the company and a pay slip with company seal.
Me: Sure.
Sms: Your credit card request has been declined.
Scene II Act II
Bank: Sir you had applied for a credit card with our bank, had you not?
Me: yes, but you had cancelled it, right?
Bank: Yes Sir, but for our corporate relationships we should not have rejected it…so we are issuing it….
Me: Thanks, send it to me.
Bank: Sir you need to give us a copy of your visiting card, photo, salary slip pdf, a photocopy of your existing card, photocopy of your pan card, a copy of your bank account, …..
Me: Hey I have given it to you…
Bank: Sir those documents are sealed as soon as we cancelled..so you will have to give it to us again. Our man will come at 4 pm….
He came at 4pm and collected all the documents…ONCE AGAIN.
Bank: Sir did you apply for a credit card….
Me: OMG yes, I did
Bank: Sir this is just a verification call…are you still there…and…blah blah…
Me: Yes, thanks
Bank: sir you will get your card in a couple of weeks…all the formalities are over.
Me: thanks
Bank sends me an sms saying ‘your card has been refused’
Scene III Act II:
Bank: Sir had you applied for a credit card with…….bank?
Me: Yes maam
Bank: Sir your card should not have been rejected, sorry sir.
Me: So?
Bank: Sir we are issuing a card…we need the following documents – one photo, one pancard photocopy, one visiting card, one letter from the company, one photocopy of your existing card (or the latest statement),………..
Me: I have given all this and more at LEAST TWICE….what the….are you doing?
Bank: Sir we have sealed the documents…so we need the documents once again…it is a simple thing sir…one pan card…
Me: Amazing guys…you wanted to give me a CHARGEABLE card (Rs. 1499 first year), you have taken 2 sets of documents – that too important ones like pancard, address proof, passport, letters on company letterhead, ….NOW I DO NOT WANT A CARD FROM YOU. I do not want to open the savings bank account also….good bye.
I really was aghast at the amount of time they could waste (they gave me a blog post is a different matter altogether)…I am happy with the Icici bank and Hdfc bank cards that I have….do not need another card for the rest of my life anyway!
Amazing and to think that I used to have shares of this HUGE bank not long ago….
I think the story is simple.
When you are dealing with a finance company, utility company, government…..you feel tired and sad that you had to deal with them at all.
If I feel like that at this age, as time goes by it will ONLY get worse….
reader
Had a similar experience with Ai-See-Ai-See-Ai credit card. I had long relationship with them through NRI acc, Demat acc, large FD and of course CC.
I’ve travel abroad for my honeymoon and the damn airline will only accept online booking through credit card. And mastercard password is not set for my CC and the stupid Ai-See-Ai-See-Ai helpdesk can’t help me to set/reset the password and twice messed up with my generic online *indefinite* account. As soon as i came back from my trip, closed all accounts and moved to it’s competitor. On the day I closed everything, I vent out my frustration out to the staff that I leave bcos of their CC. Though the staff were sympathetic the branch manager seem to be unmoved.
Felt very sad for Ai-See-Ai-See-Ai brand and felt relieved of leaving a bank that care two hoots for customer.
MangoMan
Hi Subra,
I second your experience. Since you didn’t name the card issuer. Let me complete that formality. I can say with reasonable confidence that it is none other than our great great bank issuing railway cards.
Have gone through similar experience till scene II Act II.
After that they issued the card and have been using it since then, only for online railway bookings.
Regards
prabee
I had one credit card in my life with HSBC which i never used,after getting it to get ride of the calls in 2007 and they them self closed the card in 2009.
I am tempted to make use of credit cycle but stay put as i am not regular in paying bills
Paul
Yes-Bee-Eye used to do this to me. Two application and no rejections or any communications yet.
Had the salary account with them and they send me their “GOLD” debit card and the sales man calls every day offering a CC. One day he was in very desperate mood and really begged to open a CC account. Gave the forms and still waiting for the card after almost 8 months 🙂
Happy with the Eye-See-Eye-See-Eye zero balance account and their CC.
krish
Here is my story. I am in position at par with their bank CEO. I asked for CC to my RM. They gave me a offer of credit limit which I was not satisfied. I asked them to enhance and they told this is what can be done. Take it or leave it.
What annoyed me is bank calling all the shots. You would make an application with some promises by sales guy and you end up with some thing else with totally different terms when the CC lands in your hands. Ofcourse bank knows the game that after going through all these hassles, customer would be reluctant to return the CC even the terms are not acceptable.
This unilateral power for the bank is shocking. Coming to my story, one phone call to their CEO, everything fallen in place with my terms and given whatever I wanted.
LuckyOye
Separation of banking (deposits/loans/Letters of Credit/) from Payment clearance is the absolute need of the hour. RBI better wake up and put up regulations for payment gateways at the earliest. Also needed is the separation of customer funds from customer deposits [whether demand deposits (savings a/c) or term deposits (FD a/c)]. I really don’t understand why my money goes into the balance sheet of any bank if I don’t want it to. I want to keep my money in white but not on the balance sheet of any damn bank…WHY the f*** can’t I do that?
See the happenings in the US…CUSTOMER SEGREGATED FUNDS are getting lost (MFGlobal, PNSN) and there is not even a single person arrested for it! I shudder to imagine where my money which eye-see-eye-see-eye or a-axe-ee-ss shows in my savings a/c really is.
Dr M Chandrashekhar
Most of us have gone thru similar experiences. Iam using only one credit card since the last 20 years & make it a habit to make noise periodically about their customer service etc. They are behaving well now.
Mostly the Credit Card Sales guys are outsourced guys who have stiff targets.They cannot even fill up an application form— without making gross mistakes.
Ajay
That was indeed amusing at the same time shameless for the bank staff to behave this way.
Recently I applied for a credit card from HDFC bank whom with I have a salary account too.
They did not even ask me for any proof since they already had all relevant data.
Only a single application form was signed and received card in 10 days flats. I also got the waiver on annual renewal fees.
Now that’s some mind blowing service.
Suresh
Ha you touched a raw nerve; am sure practically EVERY one of us had an ugly encounter with a declined card which we did not ask for in the first place.
Sadly ALL service providers dont. They pretend to serve in order to rake in their commission/fees whatever.
rohit s
I wonder why ppl r writing banks names like Yes-Bee-Eye… someone writes Ai-See-Ai-See-Ai… and some other guy writes Eye-See-Eye-See-Eye….. are they practicing typing here or wasting there time….what a joke… they might hav written SBI OR ICICI… what’s problem in this???????
LuckyOye
@rohit…LOL…that’s herd mentality for you! One guy starts it and all of us keep doing it, including me…but once you’ve used that word…rest assured, this page will be searched and indexed by Google…and some ppl who didn’t want that will be disappointed. Only grace would be its mentioned just once on the page, so it may not count for much.
That’s the power of the internet. Be aware of what you are playing with.
Jai Ho
Just take the cards use up the credit limit including cash limit (there are many operators swiping ur card and returning u the swiped amount in cash for a small fee) and then just default on them.
Of course u need to be staying in a rental premises so that u can change ur residence. Also u need to switch jobs and the guys in the earlier job should not know where u have joined afresh.
Simple.
U can do the same thing with ur personal loans.
Dr M Chandrashekhar
Great advice, Jai Ho — No Thanks –I would rather be clean.
Reminds me of some Indians in US, blowing up the credit cards to the limit,getting into massive debts,cleaning up the mortgaged house, parking the car ( mortgaged car)in the airport & fleeing off to India & disappearing.
PrAvEeN
Jai Ho,
That’s why they made PAN mandatory for all these things., they don’t need anything., just they update their CIBIL report and you don’t get any loan/CC. Saw some people who went back and paid three years old CC bill with intrest to clear their track record with CIBIL
Jai Ho
:):) My dear friends would u believe it.
This is exactly what my young subordinate who had joined his first job did last year. :):) He blew up all the money on the stockmarket. Poor thing. Inspite of my advising him not to gamble in the markets with leveraged money.
He is still in touch with me and I have taken him under my care. What to do. Am guiding him and nurturing him back to civilization and he has promised to live a life of goodness.
Anyways thats how life is. Get ready for the next crisis in India and it is going to be the Credit Card crisis.
Vikas Das
Hi, Great article. I also want to get a credit card but cibil score scares me. This is because I have heard that non payment in credit cards due to any reason also lowers down your cibil score. Is that true?
Vikas Das
I am constantly reading about cibil score because increasing it is has become immensely important for me. I read many blogs and found http://www.loankuber.com/content/cibil-score/ to be very beneficial. It has a section just dedicated to cibil score. Thought it would help other people like me too. 🙂