Beware of credit card companies . Review on What to Look for in a Credit Card

Credit Cards have become very very common in India and almost everybody owns one. But with the rise in the number of credit card holders, there has also been a rise in competition between Credit card companies/banks. This has led the credit card companies to devise neat little schemes(or do we term it Scams) to trap customers.

Let me detail here some of the schemes of the credit card companies that I personally OR somebody I

know has experienced.

1) ’FREE’ card?

This happened to me. I own a HSBC credit card. This card is free for 1 year and will be free in future based on my credit history. When I took this card, the supplementary card was NOT free. So I had not taken it. But one day somebody from HSBC called me and asked me if I wanted a low interest rate loan. I denied the offer.

Then they asked me if I was interested in FREE supplementary card for 1 year. I agreed.

They sent a representative with a form. I filled and gave it. The supplementary card arrived by post.

*The next month an amount of Rs 1000 appeared in the credit card bill as fee for the supplementary card, that was supposed to be ’free’.

I called up the customer service and asked them. They told me it was not free. I asked the card to be cancelled. Then they agreed to reverse the fee charged. I will have to check the credit card bill next month.

2) S/B account and Credit Card in the same bank? Trouble.

Never have a S/B account in the bank in which you have a credit card.(They ask the account number in the credit card application). In fact ICICI gives a life time free card if you have salary account in their bank. NEVER take a credit card from a bank you have an Salary account in.

This is what happened to a person I know. They(Don’t know which Bank) sent him a FREE preapproved and active credit card without asking him. He didn’t use it. But, the mistake he did was not returning the torn credit card or cancelling by phone. The next month they deducted the card amount from his S/B account, again without his knowledge.He only came to know of this when he checked his S/B account statement thoroughly, by chance.

3) Free SIM card with credit card

This happened to a relative of mine. My relative took a free Citibank credit card. The ’’credit card company’’ sent a person to the relative’s home claiming that they are giving a Free hutch postpaid connection with no rental for 2 months. But when my relative called the credit card customer service, they claimed that they had no connection with any cell phone service provider.This was just a scheme to sell a cellphone connection.

4) Pre-approved loans and credit card

This happens all the time. The credit card company send a check of a huge amount and giving us the ’privilege’ of using a low interest loan. This happen mostly during the festival season. This is just a trap for the gullible.

Similary, they send activated credit cards without asking anybody.Tear this and return it immediately if you don’t want to pay fees every year

The problem is that there is intense competition among credit card companies. This forces them to gather as many customers are possible. For this they devise these little techniques.

If you know of anymore please post it in the comments section of this review so that Mouthshut readers may be warned.