Harassed without cause

Sir — Most users of credit cards cannot agree more with the findings of the probe conducted by the investigative wing of the anti-monopoly watchdog, the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Commission (“Probe sheds light on credit card capers”, April 26). The subject of the investigation was the regular harassment suffered by customers from banks issuing the cards. As a credit-card-holder, I can vouch for the fact that all the charges named in the report are true. I have been charged late fee by several banks, including nationalized ones, even after depositing my payment cheque well before the last date. On a particular occasion, ICICI Bank refused to reverse the late fee, since it had credited the amount seven days past the due date after claiming to have misplaced my cheque. Citibank keeps changing the due date of payment, making it difficult for customers to plan payments if they are travelling. This gives the bank an opportunity to charge a late fee. About the customer service helplines, the less said the better. The tele-marketers promote loan schemes without mentioning all the conditions, which the customers discover, but usually when it is too late to retreat.

Yours faithfully,
Kalyan Ghosh, Calcutta

Sir — Customers continue to suffer at the hands of banks and their insidious schemes of extorting money because there is no machinery for the redressal of grievances of this kind. It is easy for banks to mislead their customers in various ways, for instance, by providing an incomplete statement of the conditions attached to loans, printing the terms in the tiniest fonts, or concealing the address of correspondence so that customers cannot get back with their questions. Thus deceived, customers are shocked to receive threat calls demanding payments. Sometimes, musclemen are sent to the houses of customers. It is not enough to ask the RBI to take action against the accused banks, as the MRTPC plans to do. Criminal cases must immediately be started against these banks so that they think twice before making a fool of the customers.

Yours faithfully,
Surajit Das, Calcutta

Sir — Banks play tricks with gullible customers because of the latters’ lack of professionalism. The credit card system works well in the West because the banks there are dedicated to their job of protecting the interests of their customers. The national and international banks operating in India should realize that unless they are transparent in their dealings with customers, more and more card holders will surrender their cards, and this, in turn, will affect their business for the worse. And what about the tele-callers who nag the hapless account-holders for cards, loans and the like at the oddest hours of the day? Yet, once the customers fall for such ‘grand schemes’, the banks start singing a different tune, and the same one that used to call a hundred times can no longer be contacted.

Yours faithfully,
S. Ramakrishnan, Calcutta

Sir — The findings of the MRTPC, while implicating Citibank and HSBC, leaves out the case of the credit-cards issued in the name of the State Bank of India. The credit card carries the SBI logo; applications are given from SBI branches; the staff of the SBI accosts account-holders to register for cards. But only after one buys a car, and runs into a problem, does the bank disclose that the SBI Card is a totally separate company with no financial or operational connection with the SBI.

The name, SBI Cards & Services Pvt Ltd, is written quite illegibly on the reverse of the card. No postal address is provided, only a post box number. The helpline, and a website printed on the card, do not work. An office, housed in the FMC Building, Calcutta, is guarded by abusive securitymen who refuse entry to cardholders beyond the collection counter. Other than sending undated circulars, SBI carries out no direct correspondence with the customers. Till date, I have not met any genuine employee of SBI Card and have only managed to interact with franchise-holding collectors or tele-callers, who seem to be trained to deceive and extort.

Has SBI sold its goodwill to some private operator, which has made a business of duping an unsuspecting public? Small investment schemes like Sanchaita and others were prosecuted for charging high rates of interest on deposits illegally. But what about an organization that extorts interests on interest by deliberately delaying the issue of notice of payment to customers? Will the law-enforcers wake up to the injustice against helpless customers?

Yours faithfully,
Somnath Banerjee, Calcutta

Sir — In my dealings with various banks, while I have found no reason to complain against Citibank or HSBC, my experience with two others, ABN Amro and Standard Chartered, does confirm the findings of the MRTPC.

My requests to ABN Amro to give me a statement for my credit card account had gone unheeded for eighteen months. It was only when I threatened to refuse all payments that I was sent one, and that too for the last four months. Then, almost without giving me an opportunity to look through them, the bank started pestering me for payment.

As far as Standard Chartered is concerned, I never had any problems as long as I held a Grindlays card, but the moment Grindlays and Standard Chartered merged, cheques submitted even within due date started being credited many days later. I have been repeatedly charged late fees on the ground that holidays have intruded within the date of submission of cheques and their accreditation. Since the MRTPC is making a list of rogue banks, ABN Amro and Standard Chartered should immediately be included.

Yours faithfully,
V.K. Tankha, Calcutta