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Dont bother MaxTorque, Its PL rate of interest and they will eat your credit limit.

Stan Chart even reduced my card limit to less than 1/3 but then I was not using the card anyway.

I only use Citibank IndianOil Platinum card for all the free petrol. Almost 4000 rs free petrol this year.

The interest rate on that is 18%. Generally personal loans have high interest rates, but gratuitous personal loans offered to credit card customers beats even that (they are competing with the local moneylender here). My advice would be to throw that piece of paper into the dustbin.

In particular, under no circumstances should you succumb to temptation and sign up for that loan to buy lifestyle goods.

Thanks for the quick reply. If you don't mind can you share the calculation? When I calculated the interest rate it was coming to 10.04% (like Asterix calculated). Anyways I am not going to avail the money for lifestyle spending. Currently I have a home loan with 10.25% interest (daily basis) with overdraft facility. I was exploring that will it be worth to avail this loan and keep in the overdraft account as now a days some there is a huge liquidity crunch.

You are calculating it in a simplistic, but erroneous way. This is how you are calculating it:

EMI = 7230 => Total repaid = 7230 x 36 = 260280, out of which 200000 is the principal, so interest over 3 years = 60280, or 20093 per year, which works out to 10.05%. But look at this. Suppose the interest rate is 10.05%. Then the monthly interest is 200000 x 10.05% / 12 = 1675. You are paying 7230 per month. Where is the excess 7230 - 1675 = 5555 going?

The way banks compute EMI is that part of it goes for that month's interest due, and the remaining part goes towards repaying the principal. This means that for the subsequent month, interest is calculated on a lower loan outstanding (since you have repaid part of it). The formula to use in such cases is:

E = PRK/(K - 1) where K = (1+R)^N

In your case E = 7230, P = 200000, N = 36. Solving for R you get a monthly interest rate (here, 1.5%). Multiply it by 12 to 18% as the annual interest rate.

In spreadsheet programs (Openoffice Calc/Google Spreadsheets), the formula PMT() can be used to compute EMI. Here is the one I used:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...kE&usp=sharing

If you don't calculate it this way, absurdities like a secured home loan carrying a higher interest rate than this unsecured personal loan will be seen.

For the first time in my life I am happy about a credit card rewards program!
The Citi Indian Oil CC allows you to redeem reward points at IOCL outlets. I filled fuel for Rs 2000, swiped the card and used 2000 reward points to pay the bill. No questions asked. No "illa sar" "not working sar" etc.
That to me is almost free Fuel clap:

The service standards of HDFC credit cards if deteriorating day by day. Iam using a platinum plus CC for the past two years. When i had applied the terms for waiver of annual fee were spending Rs 40,000 per year to get next year annual fee waived. At present it is 30,000/

Now HDFC has levied annual fee on my card for the third year even though the total spending the card was several time more than the limit set by bank.

Here is the reply i got from bank
"With regard to reversal of the renewal membership fee of Rs.448.32 levied to your card account on 18.12.2013 (towards the third year renewal ), we wish to clarify that the renewal membership fee would be reversed upon achieving the spend threshold of Rs.50,000.00 retail spends in 12 month period starting from the card renewal date. Accordingly, spends post the date on which the membership fee was levied will be considered in calculating the threshold spends of the third year."

What is stated in bank website is
"Spend Rs. 30,000 in a year and get waiver of next year's annual membership fee."
http://www.hdfcbank.com/assets/pdf/cc_common_MITC.pdf

In such cases, please escalate. Write a letter/email to the defined escalation path:

http://www.hdfcbank.com/personal/cus...centre/queries

In this case you are clearly in the right; please keep a screenshot of the above PDF file where the 30K claim and the URL bar can be clearly seen. You have a good case to go all the way up to the Banking Ombudsman, but you need to show that you have exhausted all the resolution options provided by the bank.

At first i have spoken to call centre and then wrote a mail to regional grievance cell in charge for karnataka. The reply i got was after this. I have again written to them with URL of their own bank site. Let me wait and see.

Beaware: standard chartered credit Card

Been using this card for years and always payback promptly ahead of time.

Decided to use point redemption one fine day, ordered a Gillette shaving product worth 750 points (MRP is just 140/-), to my surprise , they slapped me with Rs. 112/- as redemption processing charges !!

Learning: Only a stupid will order a product worth Rs 140/- against losing 750 points with charges of 112/-. Not to mention i was not aware of it till appears in statement !!

Verdict: Baware of Hidden charges.

A couple of weeks back, I was at the movies which meant I don't glance at my phone often as I usually do. Once I got out, I was in for a surprise as I was greeted with four SMS alerts from HDFC bank informing me of transactions which I definitely had not authorized
The first one was of 154 INR followed by one of 850 INR and then two successive transactions of about 4300 INR, of which only the first was at a merchant 'Travian Systems' and the rest at 'Riotgames'. I quickly called up to hotlist my card which they promptly did after confirming I still had procession of my card .
I later realised that all the transactions were used for buying games/in game purchases. I filled up the CC dispute form and have mailed it to HDFC bank hoping they'll not charge these transactions to my account.

Guys, Any advice on how to follow up with this?

1. Please get an acknowledgement from the bank that they've received and attached the dispute form to your complaint. Also, get the dispute case# if not already done.

2. Per standard norms, the bank should provide you an interim chargeback amount equal to the disputed amount, so you don't have to repay or accrue interest on it. Please verify this in your credit card account. Do note that the disputed amount will stay blocked against your card account until the dispute is resolved.

3. A final chargeback of the disputed amount will be done within a stipulated period, subject to resolution of dispute in your favor. Confirm with your bank what this time period is (it's 90 days for ICICI Bank, for example) and follow up periodically. If you are a privilege customer with access to a relationship manager, best to follow up through them for better response.

I was being followed up by my personal banker to upgrade my HDFC Credit Card to the most premium they offer which is "Regalia" card which is now applied and I should be receiving it in next 3-4 days.

1st year its complimentary
2nd year its complimentary if I run up a bill of 4 Lakhs/Annum or fees if INR 5,000

It has some nice features like :-

1. Access to lounges in airports across the world
2. 50% off in Taj for buffets ( Not sure about Alacarte)
3. Some offers on Dining, Flight Booking, Hotels etc
4. Increased reward points of 6 per Rs.75 spent
I think there are many more but, not sure. Anyone using this card can throw some light on its entire features.

HDFC definition of spend 4 lakhs and get next year annual fee waived, is actually implemented in a weird way.
The guys have informed me in writing " With regard to reversal of the renewal membership fee of Rs.xxx levied to your card account on 18.12.2013 (towards the third year renewal ), we wish to clarify that the renewal membership fee would be reversed upon achieving the spend threshold of Rs.50,000.00 retail spends in 12 month period starting from the card renewal date. Accordingly, spends post the date on which the membership fee was levied will be considered in calculating the threshold spends of the third year"

Yesterday got an sms mentioning my ICICI bank credit card is blocked suspecting compromise on it.
I checked with the call center and they said that multiple attempts for transaction were made at a single merchant for purchase due to which they blocked my card and have issued a new one against it. They didn't mention which merchant it was attempted at.
On checking luckily the outstanding amount was same as the that after my previous successful transaction. So no monetary loss!!

Thank you Chetan.

I have received an email confirming the receipt of the dispute form but they informed me there is no dispute case # form the same. Regarding the payment, they assured me I wouldn't have to pay any of the disputed transaction amounts and would be finalisng the decision on the disputed transactions within 7-10 working days.

Keeping my fingers crossed and hoping I don't have to pay for them.

On another note, I am now suspicious that my details got stolen from my android device as I had linked my CC details to my Google Play account and the thieves had used my card to purchase games/credits.