Read on to know why! Till very recently, I had a credit card (4211********9893) of GE Money. The fact is I never applied for this card. But those were the days when NDND (national do not disturb) registry was yet to come into force. So, one day I got an unsolicited call on my mobile phone. And the caller, which happened to be a very persuasive tele-marketer, somehow, succeeded in persuading me to apply for a GE Money credit card. And I obliged.
Before long, I became a holder of GE Money credit card. But I already had two credit cards, one each of HDFC Bank and Citibank. And so I never used the card except on one early morning when I was stranded at the Mumbai Airport and I had to buy an air ticket for my return flight to Delhi. I don’t know why I used GE Money card and not the other ones to buy the air ticket but the fact remains that I did use the credit card issued by GE Money.
So, on 18th April 2008, I used my GE Money credit card to book an air ticket (PNR – XJ21LF) of Indigo Airlines (InterGlobe Aviation Limited) at the Mumbai Airport. But when I received the credit card statement I noticed that Indigo had charged the amount of the same ticket twice on my credit card, one from its Mumbai office and another from its Gurgaon office. This was on 10th May when I received the statement and realized what Indigo had done. At once I called the GE Money Customer Care Executive to let GE Money know what had happened. I requested the executive to see what can be done and to take necessary action from their side. The executive told me that they will send me a dispute form which I should duly fill up and send it back to the company to take the necessary action. Incidentally, the executive didn’t ask me to get in touch with Indigo. She, don’t remember her name, said I just had to send the duly filled dispute form and the company (GE Money) will take care of the rest.
In the meanwhile, I made the credit card payment of Rs 6,874 for the amount that I had spent on booking the air ticket. However, I didn’t pay the duplicate amount. And then I waited for the dispute form. On 14th May I received the dispute form from GE Money. For the reasons best known to GE Money the dispute form or the accompanying letter didn’t have the company’s full postal address. It just asked me to send the form to GE Money Card, P.O. Box No. 3310, Jangpura Post Office, New Delhi – 110014. And mind you, this was not the address for an ordinary mail but for a dispute form, involving Rs 6,874, which must reach the company.
I am not sure if people at GE Money know that no courier company accepts a mail addressed to PO Box Number. Even the government post offices don’t accept any registered post addressed to a PO Box Number. Anyway, I didn’t have a choice but to send the duly filled up dispute form to GE Money by ordinary mail of India Post. I mailed the dispute form on 17th May. But since I had sent the form through ordinary mail I couldn’t get any proof that I had indeed sent the dispute form to GE Money.
On 4th June GE Money generated another statement of my credit card. In the statement the company acted as if there was no conversation between GE Money and me. What was worse was that the company had charged late fee and interest along with the applicable taxes and asked me to pay before the due date which happened to be 24th June. But I ignored the statement believing that the company might require some time to address the issue.
But no, GE Money was perhaps too busy to address the issue. However, the company found enough time to send another statement, which was generated on 4th July, to me. This statement had further added the late fee, interest and the applicable charges. This was clearly a message to me that I should now get in touch with Indigo Airlines.
I sent an email to Indigo Airlines on 11th July. In the email I mentioned the details of how the company had charged twice for the same ticket. On 22nd July, Mohit Arora of Indigo sent me an email with the message “Your refund amount of Rs. 6874 has been processed for PNR- XJ21LF and will reflect in your card in ten working days.” I felt a little relief and thought perhaps now GE Money will realize that my complaint was genuine and will address the issue accordingly.
It appeared I was expecting too much from GE Money. The company sent yet another statement which was generated on 4th August. The statement mentioned the refund amount but continued to add the late fee, interest and the applicable charges. Then I thought perhaps I should write an email to GE Money. For who knows they might be more responsive to the new age communication mode.
I sent an email to GE Money on 10th August requesting the company to investigate the matter and see that I am not troubled in this regard any more. Twelve days passed, but there was no response from the company. So I sent a reminder email on 22nd August to the company. Thankfully, this time Poonam Bajaj, a customer care executive of GE Money whose signature included the tag line “We Are Happy 2 Help You”, replied to my email.
Poonam Bajaj’s email read: “Dear Mr. Barnwal, With reference to your mail, we would like to inform you that the same has been registered and directed to the concern department. We will contact you with resolution at the earliest. Request you to kindly bear with us in the interim. We regret any inconvenience caused to you in this regard. Your feedback is valuable for us, as it shall help us to improve our service offerings to meet your needs better. For any further clarifications, please feel free to contact us at our customer care helpline number 39022000 (Prefix the city STD Code) or you can Login to our GE money Website: www.gemoney.in. Alternatively you can write back to us at customercare.gemoney@ge.com. Yours sincerely…” I received this email on 22nd August.
About two months passed and there was again no response from GE Money. In the meanwhile the company continued to add late fee, interest and applicable charges and send the statement after statement to me. I thought I should again send a reminder. And so on 10th November I wrote to Poonam, whose tagline is “We Are Happy 2 Help You”. My email read: “Hi Poonam, I am yet to hear from you. I mean even after two months of first writing to your company. Just wondering how much time, or rather how many months does your company take to address a customer’s complaint? Can you please provide the email id / contact number / address of the GE Money ombudsman, if your company has one, so that I could take this matter to the next higher level? Thanks, Rajesh”
On 22nd November, Poonam Bajaj of GE Money sent me an email: “Dear Mr. Barnwal, With reference to your enclosed mail, we would like to inform you that the dispute form has been sent to your mailing address and duly was delivered to ‘Sulekha’ on 14/05/2008. Please find enclosed the screen shot showing the delivery status for your reference. We would also like to inform you that we are not in the receipt of the dispute form within the prescribed timeline (60 days from the date of disputed transaction) to action on the same.
“We regrettably inform you that we are unable to take any action on the case,” Poonam Bajaj continued. “We would request you to make payment towards the outstanding according to the current statement at earliest to avoid any accrual of further charges. The financial charges accrue at the rate of 3.1% per month with service tax of 12.36% thereon. For any further clarifications, please feel free to contact us at our customer care helpline number 39022000 (Prefix the city STD Code) or you can Login to our GE money Website: www.gemoney.in. Alternatively you can write back to us at customercare.gemoney@ge.com. Yours sincerely, Poonam Bajaj, Customer Care, GE Money, We Are Happy 2 Help You.”
On the same day, 22nd November, I wrote another mail to Poonam “We Are Happy 2 Help You” Bajaj. I wrote: “Hi, If you read my mail carefully, you would realize that I have already sent the duly filled up dispute form to GE Money. In fact I had sent the form on Sat, 17 May 2008 by ordinary mail.
“For reasons best known to GE Money, the dispute form had only the PO Box address and not the complete address of the company where I could send the form through registered mail or courier.
And so, unlike you, now I can’t produce the proof of my mail in which I had sent the duly filled up dispute form back to GE Money.
“Even after sending back the dispute form, when I received yet another statement from GE Money, I had called back to your customer care number to complain why in spite of the fact that I have sent the dispute form, the company still continued to send the statement as if there was no dispute. I was told that the company will recheck and let me know. But I didn’t hear anything from GE Money. And again I can’t produce proof of this tele-conversation. But then I realised I should resort to email mode so that at least I will have some sort of proof.
“And here we are. It seems that GE Money is more interested in charging interest and late fee than solving this issue. Now, the only regret that I have is that why the hell I accepted the credit card of a non-banking company? Why? Why didn’t I just disconnect the call when I had first received an unsolicited call that offered me a credit card from GE Money? Why, when I already had two cards one each of HDFC and Citibank?
“After all, a pure play bank would never have let me go through all this mental pain? For, don’t I have a card from HDFC bank for five years without any similar negative experience? And here I am with GE Money whose credit card made me to go through a hell lot of experience on perhaps, my very first and last transaction. But I must be thankful to GE Money that it blocked my card so that I don’t get through such experience again in future. Thank you, GE Money.
“I am just thinking should I not talk about my experience so that other people don’t fall for the trap and accept a card from a non-banking entity like GE Money! But that may not be necessary, all thanks to TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India) for its DND registry. Wish everyone had registered their mobile number on the registry. Perhaps, if TRAI had acted a little early I might not have received that unsolicited call in the first place. Anyway…
“You may say that the real fault lied with IndoGo which charged twice for the same ticket. But who doesn’t error? At least IndiGo was prudent enough to make amend as soon as the mistake was brought to their notice. But GE Money is, of course, different! This is the kind of company which is more interested in charging interest and late fee than solving a dispute with its customers! Regards, Rajesh”
There is a certain six-letter word, sadist, for some reason, isn’t it? Poonam “We Are Happy 2 Help You” Bajaj and her company GE Money decided to ignore my email.
It’s 10th December 2008. I have received yet another statement from GE Money, which says there is a total amount due of Rs 3,134.36 on my credit card. And my wife, Sulekha, advises me to pay the amount to the company and let it be. But she also asks me to write of my experience with GE Money Card on my blog. And here I am. Now, let me publish the content of my last email that I just sent to GE Money.
“Dear Poonam, since you are Happy 2 Help Me let me write my last email to you and your company. So that you don’t make me happy any more. Thanks. I have paid Rs 3,134.36 the total amount due as your company claims. Please see the attached file for reference as you love to refer proofs.
“And yes, in case you don’t remember your company has already blocked my credit card number 4211********9893. Thanks once again for blocking the card! Anyway, the card was ‘long ago’ trapped in an ATM of HDFC Bank at PVR Saket, New Delhi with a message ‘Your Card Has Been Blocked by GE Money.’ This is to put on record that I no longer have your company’s credit card. Thank God for that! Good Bye and Take Care. Best Regards, Rajesh”
My last email which I have just sent to Poonam of GE Money also had a post script message. It read: “PS: Now I put the matter before the highest court where no proof is needed! I have already paid my due believing that I am at wrong. But in case I am not and in case there is indeed something called the highest court, your company will pay the Due! About that I am sure. And then you won’t need to make any one happy any more! 
”
I have a credit card of HDFC (Housing Development Finance Corporation) Bank for the last five years, and a Citibank card for two years. For some time I also had a credit card of HSBC (Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) and SBI (State Bank of India). But believe me, none of them let me go through the kind of mental pain the way GE Money did. And so I am now convinced that if there is a credit card that could give someone maximum and prolonged mental torture it’s none but GE Money Card. If you have a different opinion I would love to hear your story. But why bother. This is not a debate! Shabba-Khair and Take Care!
