With years, banks are also adding services to their customers. The Indian banking industry is passing through a phase of customers market. The customers have more choices in choosing their banks. A competition has been established within the banks operating in India.
The following are the major services provided by the Banks.
Open bank account - the most common and first service of the banking sector. There are different types of bank account in Indian banking sector. The bank accounts are as follows:
Credit cards in India are gaining ground. A number of banks in India are encouraging people to use credit card. The concept of credit card was used in 1950 with the launch of charge cards in USA by Diners Club and American Express. Credit card however became more popular with use of magnetic strip in 1970.
Credit card in India became popular with the introduction of foreign banks in the country.
Credit cards are financial instruments, which can be used more than once to borrow money or buy products and services on credit. Basically banks, retail stores and other businesses issue these.
Major Banks issuing Credit Card in India
Global player in credit card market
MasterCard
MasterCard is a product of MasterCard International and along with VISA are distributed by financial institutions around the world. Cardholders borrow money against a line of credit and pay it back with interest if the balance is carried over from month to month. Its products are issued by 23,000 financial institutions in 220 countries and territories. In 1998, it had almost 700 million cards in circulation, whose users spent $650 billion in more than 16.2 million locations.
VISA Card
VISA cards is a product of VISA USA and along with MasterCard is distributed by financial institutions around the world. A VISA cardholder borrows money against a credit line and repays the money with interest if the balance is carried over from month to month in a revolving line of credit. Nearly 600 million cards carry one of the VISA brands and more than 14 million locations in the world.
American Express
The world's favourite card is American Express Credit Card. More than 57 million cards are in circulation and growing and it is still growing further. Around US $ 123 billion was spent last year through American Express Cards and it is poised to be the world's No. 1 card in the near future. In a regressive US economy last year, the total amount spent on American Express cards rose by 4 percent. American Express cards are very popular in the U.S., Canada, Europe and Asia and are used widely in the retail and everyday expenses segment.
DinersClubInternational
Diners Club is the world's No. 1 Charge Card. Diners Club cardholders reside all over the world and the Diners Card is a all-time favourite for corporates. There are more than 8 million Diners Club cardholders. They are affluent and are frequent travellers in premier businesses and institutions, including Fortune 500 companies and leading global corporations.
JCBCards
The JCB Card has a merchant network of 10.93 million in approximately 189 countries. It is supported by over 320 financial institutions worldwide and serves more than 48 million cardholders in eighteen countries worldwide. The JCB philosophy of "identify the customer's needs and please the customer with Service from the Heart" is paying rich dividends as their customers spend US$43 billion annually on their JCB cards.
The following are some of the varieties of credit cards in India
Debit Card
Debit cards, also known as check cards look like credit cards or ATM cards (automated teller machine card). It operates like cash or a personal check. Debit cards are different from credit cards. Credit card is a way to "pay later," whereas debit card is a way to "pay now." When we use a debit card, our money is quickly deducted from the bank account.
Debit cards are accepted at many locations, including grocery stores, retail stores, gasoline stations, and restaurants. It’s an alternative to carrying a checkbook or cash.
With debit card, we use our own money and not the issuer's money.
In India almost all the banks issue debit card to its account holders.
Features of Debit Card
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Obtaining a debit card is often easier than obtaining a credit card.
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Using a debit card instead of writing checks saves you from showing identification or giving out personal information at the time of the transaction.
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Using a debit card frees you from carrying cash or a checkbook.
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Using a debit card means you no longer have to stock up on traveller’s checks or cash when you travel.
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Debit cards may be more readily accepted by merchants than checks, especially in other states or countries wherever your card brand is accepted.
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The debit card is a quick, "pay now" product, giving you no grace period.
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Using a debit card may mean you have less protection than with a credit card purchase for items which are never delivered, are defective, or were misrepresented. But, as with credit cards, you may dispute unauthorized charges or other mistakes within 60 days. You should contact the card issuer if a problem cannot be resolved with the merchant.
Loans
Banks in India with the way of development have become easy to apply in loan market. The following loans are given by almost all the banks in the country:
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Personal Loan
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Car Loan or Auto Loan
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Loan against Shares
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Home Loan
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Education Loan or Student Loan
In Personal Loan, one can get a sanctioned loan amount between Rs 25,000 to 10,00,000 depending upon the profile of person applying for the loan. SBI, ICICI, HDFC, HSBC are some of the leading banks which deals in in personal loan.
Almost all the banks have jumped into the market of car loan which is also sometimes termed as auto loan. It is one of the fast moving financial products of banks. Car loan / auto loan are sanctioned to the extent of 85% upon the ex-showroom price of the car with some simple paper works and a small amount of processing fee.
Loan against shares is very easy to get because liquid guarantee is involved in it.
Home loan is the latest craze in the banking sector with the development of the infrastructure. Now people are moving to township outside the city. More number of townships are coming up to meet the demand of 'house for all'. The RBI has also liberalised the interest rates of home loan in order to match the repayment capability of even middle class people. Almost all banks are dealing in home loan. Again SBI , ICICI , HDFC , HSBC are leading.
The educational loan, rather to be termed as student loan, is a good banking product for the mass. Students with certain academic brilliance, studying at recognized colleges/universities in India and abroad are generally given education loan / student loan so as to meet the expenses on tuition fee/ maintenance cost/books and other equipment.
Money Transfer
Beside lending and depositing money, banks also carry money from one corner of the globe to another. This act of banks is known as transfer of money. This activity is termed as remittance business. Banks generally issue Demand Drafts, Banker's Cheques, Money Orders or other such instruments for transferring the money. This is a type of Telegraphic Transfer or Tele Cash Orders.
It has been only a couple of years that banks have jumped into the money transfer businessess in India. The international money transfer market grew 9.3% from 2003 to 2004 i.e. from US$213 bn. to US$233 bn. in 2004. Economists say that the market of money transfer will further grow at cumulative 10.1% average growth rate through 2008.
With the use of high technology and varieties of product it seems that "Free" money transfers will become commonplace. We will see more bundling of tailored money services by banks and non-traditional entrants that will include "free" money transfers. Many banks will even use money transfer services as loss-leaders in order to generate account openings and cross-sell opportunities. The price evolution of money transfer products for banks will be similar to that of consumer bill pay-the product is worth giving away as an account acquisition tool to win overall market share and establish banking relationships.
ATM money transfer card products have had terrible bank adoption rates since being introduced in the last three to four years. Remitters who are highly educated and have been already been exposed to ATM technology in receiving countries tend to have an interest in this product. Money transfer to India is one of the most important part played by the banks. This service provide peace of mind to either the NRIs or to the visitors to India. Many Indian banks have ATM'S (automatic teller machine), enable to draw foreign currency in India.
By 2007, we will see a good percent of all foreign-born households doing some level of online banking. First-mover banks will start having a window of opportunity to include online transfer functionality within the next couple of years, which currently frequents traditional money transmitters such as Western Union. There is a terrific opportunity for banks and non-banks to offer more robust global inter-institutional funds transfer services online. More than half of Western Union's customers today are already banked, and most do not have an alternative product marketed by their bank that is painless, quick, and cost-effective. That will change as banks offer transfer services through their online channel.
Visa has recently introduced the 'Visa Money Transfer' option for its savings and current account holder of any bank with a visa debit card. This facility helps its customer to transfer funds from his bank account to any visa card, either debit or credit within India.
A Visa Money Transfer is of similar kind, in many respects, to the third-party fund transfer option given by some banks to its account holders through e-cheque, but this is restricted to only visa card holders.
How to transfer money?
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Log on to your bank account through your respective bank websites.
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Fill the beneficiary details like visa card numbers, name, address and then specify the amount that needs to be transferred. For bank account specify the visa card number and credit card number for paying credit card bill.
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Click on to VISA Transfer Payments button.
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Transfer immediately or on schedule date. Your account will be debited according to the date mentioned.
Mobile Banking
Mobile Banking is a service that allows customers to do banking transactions on their mobile phone without making a call, using the SMS facility.
Mobile Banking works on the 'Text Messaging Facility' also called the SMS that is available on mobile phones. This facility allows sending a short text message from mobile phone instead of making a phone call.
All that is need to do is, to type out a short text message on mobile phone and send it out to a specific mobile banking number given by the bank .The response is sent as an SMS message, all in the matter of a few seconds.
The following transactions are currently available across India -
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Balance Inquiry of all accounts linked to Customer Identification Number (maximun up to five accounts)
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Following transactions give information on primary account
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Checking the last 3 transactions in your primary account for MobileBanking
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Placing a Stop Payment on a cheque
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Requesting a cheque book
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Requesting an Account Statement
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Cheque Status inquiry
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Bill Presentment
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Fixed Deposit Inquiry
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A Help menu, which gives you the transaction codes for the various transactions
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IPIN Re-generation request
Mobile banking in India is set to explode - approximately 43 million urban Indians used their mobile phones to access banking services during quarter ending August, 2009, a reach of 15% among urban Indian mobile phone user.
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