Rs 60 Million Credit Card Fraud in India

The Bangalore Police have informed us about a massive credit card fraud by a Gang of four. The amount involved is approximately Rs 60 Million.

The Gang under the kingpin D'souza, Mourise has cheated credit card divisions of ICICI Bank, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Citibank and ABN Amro Bank. The gang's modus operandi was to obtain credit cards under fictitious names producing fake salary slips, documents, identity cards and bank statements. In this way, the Gang had accumulated 92 credit cards within a year. They would mostly go Jewellery shopping and later raise money from pawn shops.

Important: The gang also manged to win the confidence of shop owners. They have made the shop owners party in the fraud. Greedy shop owners would give them cash without actual purchase after taking a cut as their own commission. Why I am saying this ? They can have an extra swiping machine at the side and quickly capture your credit card details and commit frauds using people like D'souza at other shops. Believe me this has happened in a Mumbai Restaurant.

Few Questions to the banks involved in this Credit Card Fraud,

• Why aren't banks pro-actively Black listing shops and vendors involved in such fraud ?
• Do these banks maintain a history of vendors just like how CIBIL maintains credit card owners history ?
• Do banks keep a vendor under observation when an innocent consumer like me reports of fraudulent purchase on my cards ?

Indian government has no interest in protecting the rights of consumers. So until then, be very very careful on where you use your credit card.

Debit Cards grow Exponentially in India

Just like the growth of Mobile Phones in India, Debit Cards have witnessed exponential growth. According to a latest release by the RBI here are some facts of Debit Cards in India.

• 2 Million debit card customers are added every month
• The Debit Card user base in India now stands at 85 Million
• Debit Card user base has doubled in 2 years
• State bank of India has issued the largest number of debit cards - 30 million
• ICICI bank has issued 20 million debit cards
• Debit Cards double up as ATM cards and are mostly used for the withdrawing money
  
• The average spend at merchant establishments using debit cards is mere Rs 1,000
• A very small percentage of people actually use debit cards for retail shopping in India. Most Debit Card purchases are for - Petrol, Restaurant and Clothes.
  
• People still prefer to use Credit Cards for purchase of Air Tickets, Jewellery or White Goods

CardBhai recommends its readers not to use Debit Cards at merchant Locations if you maintain high bank balance. Why ? Because, just like Credit Card fraud, Debit Cards can also be used in fraud [Remember the extra small swipe machine they kept to steal data from your card's magnetic strip and loaded it onto another card and used to make purchases which you are not liable to pay ?] Indian Banks are really ripping their customers off without giving any protection against FRAUD. Yes, I maintain a very high bank balance and HDFC Bank is the only modern bank that provides an option not to take Debit card. Thus the only way money can go out of my account is a Cheque, which is the safest instrument in India.

CIBIL Credit Score to be available soon

Credit Information Bureau of India Ltd [CIBIL] will launch Credit Scoring system known as Cibil Credit Score. If you don't know what a Credit Score is, you can know it now here.

CIBIL is aggregating data on the basis of PAN, Passport Number, Voter ID of all borrowers. At the end of August 2007, CIBIL had credit profiles of 90 Million individual borrowers. Every month CIBIL sends out more than 2 million credit reports to various institutions to analyze a person's creditworthiness before lending.

The CIBIL Credit Score System:
It will be on a scale ranging from 100 through 999. Lower the Cibil credit score, lower the chances of getting money on credit. Say if your credit score is close to 100, then this implies, outright refusal of credit, requirement of additional security / guarantee, higher down payment , shorter duration and higher interest rates.

If you have a very high Cibil credit score, say 800, this implies, lower interest rates, waiver of processing fees and faster disbursement of funds. The CIBIL scoring system will go live by the end of this year.

How can I improve my CIBIL Credit Score ?

• Pay all your EMIs on Loans in time.
• Never fail to pay the Minimum Payment required by your Credit Card. CardBhai recommends full payment on credit card every time. Credit Card is categorized as revolving credit and is essential to build a good credit history
• Never borrow Personal Loans for risky ventures such as investing in the share market.

Don't be disheartened. Credit system always gives scope for improvement. At any point of time you can start improving your credit score by simply paying of all your debt and not opting for more until your score inches higher.

Questions and comments can be sent to feedback @ cardbhai.com.

Reliance Consumer Finance Launch next week

Breaking News: We had reliable information about Anil Ambani managed Reliance Capital venturing into Consumer Finance in a big way. [Various FIIs had written about this in their research report] It is now official that the launch will happen sometime next week - tentatively on Thursday, the 18th of October.

Reliance Consumer Finance [RCF] is a subsidiary of Reliance Capital Limited. RCF will offer the following products,

• Personal Loans
• Home Loans
• Commercial Property Loans
• Loan against Property
  
• Auto Loans - 2 Wheeler + Car Loans
• Commercial Vehicle Loans
• Loans for Small and Medium Enterprises / Business

You can now apply for any of the above said loans by simply sending an SMS Loan to 55454 and a representative will get in touch with you. [They may touch base after the 18th]

Yatra + Barclay Credit Card

Yatra.com India's leading Travel and Vcation portal has tied up with upcoming credit card company in India - Barclays Card to launch a co-branded care - Yatra BarclayCard.

This card is specially designed for the Indian Traveler and Business Men on the move. The card will allow the customer accumulate multi-carrier frequent flier miles [Yatra Miles Programme] and wide range of benefits. This card will have global acceptance and will have liberal credit limit.

BarclayCard has an exclusive Indian website.

Petro Credit Card endorsed by Dhoni

On the occasion of 8th birthday of Petro Card in India, BPCL has launched exclusive Petro Card endorsed by Dhoni.

The card comes at a cost of Rs 250 and residents of Tamilnadu are not eligible for the current offer. Hurry this offer ends on the 31st of October. If you want a Petro Card, then you can apply now.

Use your Petro Card and double your Petro miles between Today and 6th of October.