Here is list of few surprises for you if you are customer with Citibank from last 8 years. cleared all payments and maintain a good relation ship. Don’t be surprises if you also follow the same.
1) You get a call from Gurgaon, that you have a pre approved loan of Rs. X(in lac’s) seeing your relationship at this rate. And if you need our executive can visit you for checks / few paper formalities. Executive comes to you and takes checks too - and after around 7 days you come to know that they have rejected the loan application as you have car loan running with them from last 2 yrs. Surprise - as by this time you have already done further commitments to use this money. This happens to me twice and now I don’t trust them any more for pre approved loan. 2) Another good thing - I called phone banking people and they told me that my card has a pre approved loan of Rs. X at 14% reducing. I told him that I need higher than that and suddenly he says yes he can do - with offer to give waive of 75% of processing fee and at 14% I told him okay give me 1 hour to think and see if I can use this money. in one hour when I again got his call and I approved - he says now that rate of interest is 15% instead of 14%(isn’t joke?) they show you something and suddenly charge you something else. 3) Letter from them: - lot of time they sent you letter via post / courier which never reaches you. but surprisingly statements do reach you in time without delay. I have list of letters which phone banking people tells me that this is dispatched but they never reached me. One good instance, people from Chennai told me AWP number - and when I tried at first flight site that number does not exists. now its been 1 month I have not received letter and cannot check on first flight site. you can imagine if letter is dispatched. if letter is crucial - that letter never reaches you 4) one check bounce and you face this music if you have one check bounce(may be you are not in country / out side / or your friend given his payment and that bounces(virtually that is not your check even) this is what it can happen to you. a) your all credit / debit cards with Citibank will get blocked b) now when you drop payment it will not be credited in 4 days now it will take 10 days. c) revolving finance is one we can understand. d) your internet access to your account is blocked. e) you become culprit for them - and start getting collection calls - may be this is first time in last 8 yrs. f) you are no more valuable customer for them. This is what happened to me - check bounces on Jan 14, 2007 - I got notification by them on 15th about that via email. on 16th I deposited all pending amount(previous statement, other spending, excess of Rs. 19) via cash. On 17th I came to know that I cannot do payment of Rs. 1300 as card is blocked. - isn’t strange.
And now it will take 10 days to credit checks to my account so I have to deposit all checks atleast 10 days ahead of statement due date. When I asked them where it is written in terms and condition - they always send welcome kit which doesn’t say anything. or they say they will investigate and get back to me - which they never. I have a list of people from chennai / gurgaon who claim to be senior people but never respond. Same with email support to head. Customer care or sanathan.k both they respond with one standard reply that - you will receive a respond in 14 days but after that you never get any response.I count it as delaying tactics. Another good thing - suddenly on 16th of Feb - when everything is coming to normal nothing is due on any card - you have received new statement that things are okay - and you start using your card again. your internet access is blocked - when you check with phone banking they tells you that since there is check bounce it blocked.(so they came to know this after 1 month) and it is more than 45 days they have sent me 3 new internet passwords(one more is there in courier I don’t know when I will recieve that) and none of them works. Customer Care people keep giving your false promises to get back to you but no one calls you back - only thing I get is every time who picks you need to explain him the case - only then he forward to senior else he will say that he cannot forward this call. So indirectly you need to waste 15-30 mins explaining him about this. Without internet access I lost all my transactions / expenditures - and forcefully I cannot use card till I have things working again. After all this I decided to file a complaint with RBI under section 8g for delaying credit of check and other things which harass me. but for that you need BSRB code(I don’t know what is this) when I checked with them they taken almost 45 days(after around 15 days) that they don’t have that number. and sent me letter saying that citibank is working with RBI for this code - and if I need some more information I should contact RBI directly. isn’t good joke. Bank is really good - its really hard for me to leave this bank after 8 yrs of relationship. thanks to customer care people who never care for you. but you should be very cautious while using the things. they can always come and say you that - your card is blocked b’cos there is check bounce 3 yrs back. and they put on rules as per their perception and these rules are not written anywhere. Like they need 4 days to clear check in normal times but 10 days in special cases. You can be charged with interest they want - not agreed with you. they can change your credit duration as they want not as agreed.
And as per them all these comes under that Citibank reserves right to change terms and condition any times. Good joke - anyways I have already decided to leave them and try to use some other banking person where I get a good respect at-lest not false promises. Thanks
Vinay.