Touting Credit Cards in India, July 2004

The rapid growth of the private sector over the past decade has taken several forms (banks, automobiles, airlines, retail, real estate, etc), one of which is the proliferation of credit cards. Usually India is a land of scarcities (water, electricity, health care), but there is certainly no shortage of plastic money. In fact, it's a problem of plenty.

As with anywhere else in the world, the choices are unlimited as the players are innumerable: HDFC, Citibank, ABN Amro, American Express, State Bank of India, HSBC, Standard Chartered and ICICI to name a few.

As an example of the boom in credit card use, Visa International on Tuesday said its card sales volume in India grew by 80% to $3.2 billion for the first quarter of 2004m with retail sales volume rising by 61% to $569 million in the January-March.

With direct sales to the customer being used as the card providers' unique selling proposition, each company has an army of boys parked throughout New Delhi. They can be found perched just about everywhere. At market places these agents approach to say that buying their card could fetch huge shopping discounts.

At petrol stations they say the card allows its owner to fill up without surcharges, outside cinema halls movie discounts are offered, outside hospitals free life insurance is thrown in, at restaurants its pizza discounts, outside homes they offer anti-burglary devices, at five-star hotels its room discounts; some even hang around public toilets to catch relieved customers in a good mood.

There are personal innovations in their selling, too. For instance, outside hospitals they begin by quoting the Gita, or some other such religious text, to remind of the uncertainty of life and the need to plug it with the card. One can catch their polite whispers all the time. "Excuse me sir," they gently butt in. The tone is familiar. In Bangkok any visitor knows very quickly that such messages mean massage girls are on offer; here it is credit cards.

At one time the paan waala (betel sellers) could be found around every corner, now it is the credit card touts. And they stand out: they are always dressed like corporate executives, but a bit sweaty (they don't perform inside air-conditioned conference halls). They have become almost a cultural fact of life in Delhi, and other major centers.

Such is the array of choice that it sometimes becomes difficult to choose one brand over another. After a little research one discovers that the cards all offer similar credit ranges, give and take a few tie-ups. It also becomes apparent that the discounts are covered by the high rates of interest on the card. Over the past few years, millions of Indians have bought credit cards, which has also spawned an institution of burly men who try to track down the huge number of defaulters. As an example of similarity, most banks charge interest of 2.95% per annum; while international brands are lower: American Express charges 2.75%.

I wanted a credit card to replace the more risky debit cards I own, but I made a mistake. I gave my mobile number to five boys out in the sun, just to find out more details. The credit card companies are smart; for telemarketing they have employed young and sweet-sounding girls, who are difficult to refuse. The poor boys rough it out in the open passing on the telephone numbers they collect to their female counterparts functioning from better environs.

The girls are similar in their persistence, though. After a couple of calls, they acted more familiar. One beseeched every morning: "Sir, pleeease, pleeease, you have to buy our card." Another called a few moments later: "Sir, if you don't take my card I will not talk to you anymore." Three others also made it a point to call regularly to make similar difficult-to-refuse requests. Soon, I was on first name basis with the girls - Renu and Anu, to name a couple. My wife thought I was having a swinging time. It is not often that so many women treat one with so much importance. Some friends tell me that their wives even changed their views about them, thinking they must be sexy with so many girls calling - their spouses even started behaving better, they said.

The problem was I couldn't decide. The girls do matter, but how does one choose from products that do not differ - it is like trying to choose from five pairs of black identical trousers with five similar-sounding girls pleading with you to take theirs. Ideally, I should have taken all five, but I didn't require more than one card to begin with, and more than one annual fee.

Ideas occurred to me. One was that I should change my mobile number to avoid the girls as well as the plastic. But that would be escaping a situation and not solving my need for a credit card.
The second was akin to a swayamwar (marriage selection) wherein I meet the five girls one by one and eliminate them based on other criteria, as they all sounded similar. This, too, did not gel as I soon realized that that the ones who talk do not necessarily meet.

If there is a request for a meeting, it is again the guys out in the field who take over. I told one of the girls that I would like to meet her to solve my dilemma. She took my address and sent across one person from the army of boys. As per some unstated rule, the boys do the running around while the girls only talk on the phone. I did feel a little cheated.

The boy came on a bike, smelling like a distillery of sweat given the hours he spends on the road. He spoke by rote and recited the same paragraph again and again for every query. I asked him a different question but he gave me the same answer. Even tourist guides are better. He drank a lot of refrigerated water, asked me for my bank statement and whether I owned a car and a house. I signed at three spaces and he shook my hand and left, saying that the card would be on its way.

Soon, I was the owner of a new credit card, yet the other four girls continued to call. I had to bring my wife into the picture. Women have a way with each other. She simply asked them to stop calling and they did. "You aren't what I was beginning to think you were," my wife remarked.

Life is back to normal, except for a few behavioral changes in my wife and continuing calls from my current credit card provider that I should pick up an add-on card for her. Now that's risky. This one I have decided to handle on my own, be what may.