I have been a customer with the bank for nearly ten years. I have a savings account, a home loan account, and 2 credit cards. My wife holds supplementary credit cards - these cards are not used regularly and has been taken for emergency purpose.
In Oct 2004 I changed my recidence and intimated the bank. This was acknowledged by them with a letter to me in Nov 2004. From then on I started receiving my bank statements on the new address, though not the credit card statements. Since the supplementary card was never used, this was taken as normal.
In Nov 2006, my wife lost her card and requested a new replacement. This was received along with a stament which showed a balance of nearly Rs.10, 000/-. On enquiring we found that a transaction had taken place on this card in Jan 2006. On checking the records, we found that the bank has been debiting my savings accounts towards minimum payment since January 2006.
When we enquired we were told that there has been a transaction in Jan 2006. An airline ticket has been bought on this card.
Our repeated requests to furnish the details of the transaction fell on deaf ears, and the bank went on deducting money from my account. Finally having failed to get the information that we needed, we stoped the auto debit facility in March 2007
Then the payment follow ups started, and no amount of reasoning helped. It culminated two days back with a call from a manager from their Cunningham Road branch. He was rude and abrasive. When I reminded him that I have been a customer for 10 years, I was told that it does not matter to the bank. I was rudely told not to raise my voice, and that he "was not finsished with" me. When I objected I was told that they will debit the full amount from my account, and I could go to court if need be. I was also told I could close my account if I wanted to.
The bank holds that I should have intimated the incorrect transaction immediately. When pointd out that we did not know because they did not send us the statement, their answer was that we did not update the address. When again I pointed out that the address change was intimated to the bank, and the account statements are being received at the new address, their logic was that the credit card address was the old address, and since statements were returned from there, they have stopped sending statments there
Yet, they have been deducting my account for 11 months. Apparently they have a system for transferring funds between accounts, but not for tallying addresses. FOR 11 MONTHS THEY DEBITED MY ACCOUNT BUT NEVER BOTHERED TO SEND ME A STATEMENT.
Now consider this :
I maintain a large balance in the bank.
BTW, I still haven’t received the details of the transaction.
If this is the treatment I receive, you can guess the fate of a new customer.
The choice is yours