While selling ICICI Credit Card, the agent must have told you that the balances can be paid by Cash, Cheque, Bank Transfer etc absolutely FREE of cost. However, the same is not true any more. ICICI has introduced a whopping Rs 100 FEES for Cash Payment of Credit Cards [Plus Service Tax etc] with effective from June-1st. This is very similar to what HDFC introduced without informing its customers in December-07.
Senior RBI official is of the following view,
As per general rules, cash should be an accepted mode of payment every where. While the RBI does not regulate services charges, it examines the reasonability aspect on a case-to-case basis.
Say, if your credit card bill is mere Rs 500 and you don’t hold an ICICI Bank account and hence pay the bill in CASH. If you are charged Rs 100 + taxes in your next statement, you will definitely feel ripped off.
We feel that this charge is unjustified and the Credit Card companies are simply ripping off prompt customers letting lose the defaulters who have risen to 15%.