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Virtual Cards – A safe way to purchase online
Whether it is from Amazon India or Flipkart or Snapdeal or Aliexpress, I buy from all of them a lot and regularly – bordering on making me an online shopaholic. Credit Card vs Debit Cards I prefer to use Credit Cards instead of Debit Cards. Let me be clear, credit card interest rates are brutal and horrific. I don’t use the credit offered by Credit Cards beyond the free 30 day period – I ensure I settle 100% (sometimes round it off over and above) of the amount due on receipt of the statement every month. With Credit Cards, the dispute/deniability of a fraudulent transaction (say done online) is a…
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Small businesses are backbone of Indian economy
In the past, I have written a few times in this blog about “Challenges of Doing business in India” and “Running a Product business in India“. Is it only thorns along the way? not really. There have been many instances of “Small Indian Companies that have stood over time” and how you can succeed by taking advantage of technology and the first step for that will be to “Secure your business website“. In this background, I was happy to see a new initiative titled “The Action Committee for Formal Finance for Non-corporate Small Businesses”, certainly a mouthful. The group is constituted by leading organisations from across India, to create a financial architecture for…
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Unexpected money I got thanks to SEBI
Who hasn’t faced a money crunch from time to time?. Few weeks back I was in one such phase. I was dreaming I will hear from the estate of a diseased Uncle who was forgotten and get a windfall. (For records I tried and elders in my family could account for all our Uncles & Aunts for last 3 generations ). Just then an email came from eCAS_MutualFunds at manipaltechnologies.com. Thinking it is the regular reminder emails for some payments due, I was about to delete the email without reading it. Just then the words “Non Transacted Folios” caught my eye. In the preceding week I liquidated all the few…
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Closing my ICICI Accounts
Over the last few years I have tried to simplify my personal banking by reducing the number of Bank Accounts and Credit Cards to two each. Some of these accounts you sign up for a specific purpose but then managing them, maintaining the minimum balance is a pointless hassle. I began this route in 20th August 2009, when ICICI introduced 3D Secure and I noticed few indemnification clauses that put me in risk as a consumer even for their technical faults which it doesn’t sound fair to me. I couldn’t find these clauses used even by the Foreign banks like Citibank and Standard Chartered. I called them and closed the…
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Dollar movements, Revisiting after 4 years
I wrote a blog post “Dollar Movements” nearly 4 years back in 2008, a week before the Lehman brothers collapsed and the US recession that followed. The western world still hasn’t recovered from that shock and its ripples, India with China showed resilience and solid growth but they both seem to be running out of steam now. India’s growth has now slowed and Dollar once again gaining. In the last 12 months Indian Rupee has depreciated more than 27% to US Dollar, see the chart below. The data was from RBI Archive webpage and you can download the data from this Excel file here. Unlike last time I am rejoicing…
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Credit Card International transactions
Just like many of you, I make international purchases online using my credit cards. Most of the time this is the easiest, hassle free when compared to wire transfers and sometimes this is the only option to pay. I have read in magazine articles that using Credit Card is recommended and can be cheaper than Traveller’s cheque or Currency conversion while travelling as well. Many of the international transactions are in US Dollars and it will be converted to local currency (Indian Rupees) by your credit card issuing bank to prepare your statement. I never thought there will be differences in the conversion rates charged by them. Out of curiosity,…
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Consumer Protection for Credit Card Users
T.Nagar Talk (a local paper) today carried a piece about Centre for Social and Economic Justice. This Organizations runs a site creditcardvictims.org for helping consumers for their rights with credit card companies. The site offers some good advice on smart usage of credit card. Though sites like this are common in the USA, even the popular TV Show Oprah has a website on this – but in India, this is a new effort. Read my earlier post on Credit Card Regulations in India. Last week I had a good experience – for official use I had bought 3 mobile phones on a same day from one shop with my Citibank card. I…
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RBI guidelines on credit cards
Thank you Reserve Bank of India (RBI, which is the US Fed equivalent of Government of India) RBI yesterday issued its final guidelines on credit cards, to all Banks and NBFC’s (Non Bank Finance Companies). This guideline is a “God” sent answer to the long prayer of Indian Credit Card users, who were at the mercy of issuers. The guideline addresses several of consumer pain points: Credit Limits cannot be enhanced unilaterally by the issuer “No” to Unsolicited Card/Charges/Loans Every customer complaint will have to be issued a docket number Issuers should not make any intimidating or harassing collection calls to customers Banks should also maintain a Do Not Call Registry (DNCR) containing…
