Six years back (i.e. around 1999), during my initial years in the job, ICICI was the buzzword. It was a wonderbank. An Indian bank with MNC facilities, look-n-feel. Those were the days when you still had to go to a bank with passbook, get it printed to be updated, had to stand in big queues with ’’tokens’’ to withdraw money. ATM was to be seen only in Airports, and big Hotels, and few upmarkets places. ICICI had started-off changing all that. I helped my girlfriend (not my wife) open a ICICI bank account, and man, was I impressed. It was a branch in NOIDA, UP, (close to Atta Market). It was small branch, and we were offered soft-drinks while we waited, and were personally attended-to. Then after 3 years, I visited the ICICI branch for the 2nd time. And I saw what kind of success ICICI was having. The small 8 person branch had changed into a 30-40 ppl branch, spanning 3 floors of a decent sized building. So far so good. I went in, and had to draw some cash, and get a draft made. By the time we were thru with it, I could feel that we’d moved back in time, and it felt like the ’’get-token-and-wait’’ days. The place was filthy, crowded, and the staff was unresponsive, callous, down-right rude. It wasn’t the same ICICI anymore. That was personal banking. Unfortunately inspite of this I had to open an account there. Frankly, I’ve been trying to close that account for the last 2 years, and now having moved to Bangalore, umpteen letters, mails, phone-calls have not moved the ICICI to help me close that account.
Then came the numerous nightmarish stories of ICICI Home Loans. My close friend and colleague had made to run arond like a dog, and had to take time-off from work for almost 1 full week, because the ICICI branch had misplaced his EMI chequeus, and had levied penlaties on him, saying that he had never given the EMI chequeus that had gone missing. A lot of running around, talking to their call-centre, their managers, and manager’s managers finally brought justice. This was not an isolated incident, as I’d heard too many similar or related incidents.
Finally the ICICI credit-card onslaught started. You may find it hard to believe, but I must have received 100s of unwelcome calls soliciting ICICI Gold card (free for lifetime). When a colleague did fall into this trap, he soon got a statement from ICICI about his membership fees. Well, it could be because of the unscrouplous Direct-Marketing-Agents who only care about their per-card commission.
All this about ICICI, and Rs.200-Rs.240 per share public-issue!! Sheesh... But then, their business is doing good (maybe I’m just plain perfectionish and fussy about quality), so it may make sense.