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The same thing happened with my HDFC allmiles card. Can you share some more details on this exclusive YES bank card, so that I can check it out?

I did check it out on their website. It has 50L income requirement and 10k joining/annual fees.

As a matter of principle I don't pay any fees on credit cards. :-)

With these upcoming banks such as YES or Indusind, getting a credit card seems pretty easy. I happened to receive a cold marketing call offering lifetime free Indusind Platinum credit card. I did check the documentation and paper I signed and it did mention the card is free for life.

5k-10k joining fees is a sham I guess, only to make one feel delighted at having landed a sweet deal.

With several merchants now charging 2-3% extra for high value credit card transactions, using cards everywhere, one anyways ends up paying a premium. So I don't see any reason to pay fees on credit cards when customers are getting screwed one way or the other.

If a merchant that is not a government-controlled agency wants to charge extra for paying with a credit card, I often vote with my feet. The only time I haven't in recent past is when I bought an Activa last May - Tansi wanted to charge extra for paying with credit card, so I chose to pay with cheque instead (the vehicle delivery was consequently delayed by the time it took the cheque to clear).

With government agencies, you don't have a choice sometimes. I pay the electricity bill (KeSEB) with a markup, out of compulsion. Similarly for IRCTC. My BESCOM bill I pay via the zero-cost bill pay system offered by my netbanking (which is also charged to the card). I use a zero-fuel-surcharge card for petrol.

Any specific instances you had in mind?

Even I want to do the same but the merchants have all huddled together so there is no option but to pay the surcharge, unless amount is settled in cash/cheque/wire transfer.

Same with me. Of the 4 cards with me, only one has fuel surcharge cashback and it is the only one I use.

None too different than yours. However, in a very recent incident, I bought jewellery and offered to pay by credit card. Now, since the purchase was big, I gave three cards (Diners, Visa, Amex) to split the bill among these. The cashier informed me following surcharges Visa - 0%, Diners - 1.5%, Amex - 3.5%. I had a good 30 min argument but eventually agreed to pay up the surcharge.

Now the thing is I actually am able to recover all the surcharge back in form of points apart from getting 20-50 days interest free credit and big purchases on credit card helps me negotiate on waiving annual fees.

The thing is that it is merchant's responsibility to negotiate best deal with the bank. If my card has 10k annual fees, I don't go around asking merchants to give me 100 rupees discount. Then why does merchant pass on his levy to me?

Its easier if you have an account with them, otherwise they dont even bother to respond to an enquiry. Mine came as a surprise as I had given up on it. Exclusive card is equal to the HDFC Infinia, comes with all the top class benefits and points.

I dont fall in that category but has a savings with them, neither I pay annual fee to any of my cards till date.

I dont know about Indus, but try Yes bank, they dont approve that easy. I had a tough time following it up. Even HDFC has become stricter in approving higher cards. Although my transaction and repayment history is very good since 10 years, they still dont want to give me a Regalia inspite of requesting for 6 months ! Thats what made me turn towards Yes Bank.

All credit cards have that surcharge at certain POS regardless of the item or cost. Most cases, its charged by the payment gateway than the banks. I had an ecommerce website earlier, my payment gateway (PayU) was offering zero fees as an introductory offer, so none of my clients had that extra charge. Now they are charging. If you check the CC Avenue or PayU website, you get a detailed fees structure. Jewellers always charge that extra while swiping card. If you know them personally, they will even wave it off too ! By the way, I paid for Bluestone jewellery few times, nothing was charged extra !

HDFC is definitely the strictest when it comes to making offers. They won't give big cards or even upgrades easily. However, I find them to be most professional and least to fall for cheap marketing tactics.


I understand that the POS charges (1-2%) are the agreement between merchant and bank for using the bank's services. I don't understand why this should be pushed to customers?

So when I bought platinum jewellery, I wasn't charged anything that too at two different jewelers, both of whom were happy to accept cards.

When I bought gold from another shop of this very jeweler, he was adamant to charge me extra clearly mentioning that even though they are not allowed to charge extra, they do so since gold jewellry has lesser margin than platinum jewellery!

This is another reason why none of them will endorse this charge separately on bill but instead club inside some labour/making charges. If merchants were legitimately allowed to charge, why would they deny endorsing the same on bill?

Some businesses just don't have enough margins that would allow the merchant to support card payments. Even shops selling Electronics at competitive prices have to pass on the surcharge to the buyer otherwise they won't be able to run a profitable business.
If you wouldn't bargain and agree to buy the product at MRP from such a store, they would gladly accept payment through credit card.
The problem is that the service charge is on the full transaction value. In such cases, the service charge on a 30k phone would be more than the margin the seller has on the product.

I have been spending Lakhs in the previous months buying construction material for my house and farm and I buy from big dealers in bulk. They deal at such a low margin (confirmed by asking the prices from respective distributors) that they can't afford to take payments via CC. In that case, either I pay via Cheque but that takes a long time in clearance, so what I do is add them as a beneficiary and transfer money via NEFT as that usually only takes an hour or two.

I don't think it is a crime for a merchant to add their operating costs to the price they charge their customers; and the general expectation is that the principles of economics take care of that aspect. In India differential pricing based on mode of payment has been around even before credit cards came into the picture.

The point has been settled in USA and is going through litigation in Canada and UK in my knowledge. Not sure if there any law regarding this in India.

I don't buy jewellery often; but the times I have bought it has been from Bhima on Dickenson Road. They never charged extra for card payments.

In Kerala I have bought in Malabar and Kalyan; there too no extra charges.

Thanks for the heads up; I found out now only this thread.

Also, a friend who I recommended the Regalia card, mentioned that the fuel surcharge waiver also has some changes.

The HDFC Regalia page says 1% fuel surcharge will be waived off. So, I guess we're even paying some amount for fuel now.

I'm getting disillusioned by HDFC Regalia and have a long, unknown way towards Infinia!

Considering the Citi PremierMiles at the moment, but they don't have a fuel surcharge waiver.

True that and American Express is particularly notorious for charging as much as 3.5% to the merchants.

I found IMPS to be even faster with ICICI allowing unlimited (<10 lakh) transfer within 30 mins of adding beneficiary. Further, IMPS is 24x7 as opposed to NEFT which works only in banking hours.

So RBI has issued a circular stating that:

However, the statement also categorically mentions debit cards. I am yet to find anything similar for credit cards but this is what American Express wrote to me when I probed them on this issue:

I do feel there is some grey area when it comes to credit cards in India. I'll be glad to learn more about this.

May be it depends on the bill value or brand to brand !
You should enquire for the Yes Exclusive or Preferred Card. I am curious to know how the bank responds.
The best thing my wife liked about my new Exclusive card is the line that mentions : "Family gets 3 crores if the card holder dies in an air accident" :D

Yes, I'm aware of that circular. It talks only about the contractual obligation between the merchant and the acquirer. The RBI is leaning on the banks to ensure they enforce these contracts. It does not make such charges illegal (it only wants banks to threat such charges as contract violations, which are civil in nature).

In the US this clause was challenged in the court and the court held the clause itself to be illegal. In UK and Canada such a challenge is currently progressing through the court system.

Inquire whether they'll waive the joining/annual fees? Could try, but I don't like to give out my mobile number to banks. :-(

This is pathetic Man! HDFC call their cards as "Superpremium" category cards for what if they cannot even pass on the fuel surcharge waiver.

I have tried out my wife's SBI staff card as well which also I found out does not have a fuel surcharge waiver.

What I understood from these banks is that the charges liable are charged by Mastercard and Visa who in-turn are not passing the waiver to the banks who then claim the amount from the customer. :Frustrati

Cheers,
Amey

Fuel surcharge was capped @1% by Government. This charge will be on oil companies not dealers. That's the reason fuel surcharge waiver @1%.