What’s Card-iology?** Ever heard about the term “House of cards” or “Marriage on the cards”?
I have discovered a new meaning of the terms. How, read on the true story to find out.
A true story of Card-yak arrest
On one typical dull workday, a kind of day when you really don’t care whether it’s a Monday or Thursday, & just look forward towards the weekend, I receive a call from ICICI Credit Card call center. The gist of the call was I have more than half a lac of Rupees as outstanding payment on my card & my card is blocked.
I got a jolt. I am using this card for more than a year now & never defaulted before. I knew I had bought air tickets for my Delhi trip on Diwali & few mundane buys here & there, but the outstanding amount sounded scary. I dropped whatever I was doing at office & quickly logged on to the ICICI Bank Credit Card website. The good thing is, a single user ID & password allows me enter into all the multiple relationship I have with ICICI viz Bank Account, Credit Cards etc through one common homepage. In a jiffy I reach my card account & check the details.
The girl on phone was right, it’s indeed was some 56, 000 bucks outstanding which included some 14000 bucks overdue from last month, late fees, service tax on late fees, services charges on late fees, service tax on service changes, overdue charges plus tax & so on. All such fees & taxes summed up to around Rs two thousand. As the outstanding amount was large, my card was temporarily blocked.
Now, that was insulting & derogatory to my self-esteem.
My wife is very particular about bill payments & most of the time we drop the cheques on the ‘pay by’ eve (apply the logic of Christmas eve or new years eve here) or on the ‘pay by’ date. A quick conversation with her & am assured that the cheque was dropped before the due date. Confident & furious, I called the call centre back. I clearly told them that they must have lost the cheque in transit. I also explained that normally once a cheque dropped in the box, it is normally found in the same box only. Then where has the cheque gone? I threatened them that I will get to the bottom of it & drag them into consumer court for harassment. The agent assured that he would look into the matter & get back to me soon.
Next day, I receive a call saying, the bank indeed received a cheque, which was well before the due date. The problem was the date on the cheque was of year 2006, so the cheque was not honored. Though the guy was polite enough, I took him to task.
“How can you expect someone to write a cheque & verify the date every time? It’s clearly the banks fault, which failed to notify me on time”.
I said I want a proof on what he intimated along with the cheque. The guy again was trained to be extremely polite in harsh situations.
”Sir, the cheque was couriered to your registered address 2 weeks back”.
Now I need to clear the outstanding payments, changes, fees etc to get my card activated.
Okay, one call again with home minister, & an envelope is found underneath couple of “Brunch” issues. The envelope was lying around & to save it from our kids’ spontaneous artworks, she had to “keep it in a safer place”. When we keep something in a safer place, we invariably forget the existence of it.
Nevertheless, I don’t give up so easily. I call them up again. This time I change my stance into more attacking mode.
“You guys send numerous sms & promotional materials everyday. We thought the envelope contains some such rubbish offer & didn’t bother to open & check. Why couldn’t you send me an email or sms saying that the cheuqe was courired?” I grouse.
This logic put them onto back foot. Sensing win, I demand reversal of all the fees, charges & all those dirty numbers, which they imposed on me. The guy, quite hammered by now said he could reverse the service charges & associated Taxes, but can’t reverse the late fine.
“Gimme your superior’s number”, I demanded. He said he can’t disclose but I mail to customer care, it would be escalated to higher officials. Meantime I got a mail from some “Urvi Mehta” who requested me to clear the outstanding payments. At this point of time I paid the outstanding amount including the charges.
I wrote a stinker reply explaining how I was not intimated about my card blockage & not alerted on time. Clearly my intention was to pay the dues on time, & the error on cheque date was inadvertent. I put the entire blame on the card management & threat to defame them by writing to press & how I had to face humiliation & agony etc etc. However, I gave details of the cheques deposited to clear the overdue amount & requested to activate the card, reversing all fines & charges.
It worked. I received a call next day apologizing for my inconvenience. The agent told me that all the charges, Taxes would be reversed which would reflect on the next statement.
The card was activated the same day.
The entire 2000 bucks of fees, fines & taxes were reversed.
Ba-cardy Breezer
Same day I receive another call saying that my present lifetime free Gold Card would get a free upgrade to a Platinum one with a increased credit limit. No hidden conditions. No bad, I thought. We virtually live on credit these days & follow the old Sanskrit saying “ Wrinang krtiwa; Ghritam pibet” (If I have to survive on loan, let there be ghee)
While I was basking on the glory of my victory I receive a call from home. It’s Citibank card payment this time. The cheque is deposited on the wrong box, on the last date. I get on the job again……
Moral of the story
Ok…err…nothing actually.
Post script-
You might have already understood the trick to deal with Credit Card sharks.
Few rules may come handy-
1. Check the payment due date & avoid 11th hour payments.
2. Open all envelopes that come to you by courier.
- Offence is the best defense, while dealing with call centers. Remember, customer is the king.
4. Don’t keep payments overdue for long, if claims are justified. Fight after you clear the dues.
5. Sounds utopian, but humanitarian & sentimental stories works best in most cases.
6. Its better to put things on record, than chatting on phone with dumb agents. Call center girls are usually extremely polite & always "sorry". It's a test of one's patience.
7. You can insist on reversal of charges & fees if your payment track record is good & consumption volume is high.
8. Be ready to repeat personal information like date of birth, mother’s maiden name, address & telephone publicly on phone. If you dislike the same & want to avoid, opt for a TPIN (Telephone Personal Identification number).
9. Keep a regular check on the Card account online.
- Never give up; fortune favors the brave (husbands).
