The only way anyone can qualify to be employed at ICICI bank is by proving beyond any substantial doubt that they are insensitive, dimwit morons.
I have been banking for 7 years now, and after fiddling with different banks I can say that: if anybody needs an Ulcer or high blood pressure, then please please go and open an account with ICICI Bank. If you have not lost your temper, felt frustrated or have not given a death threat, then ICICI bank is missing in your life.
The bank tortured me for more than 3 months before they issued me my chequebook/debit card. (This was after I had transferred more than 3 Lakhs into my trading account).
If you intend to call one of their call centers, then please keep the rest of your day free. Firstly, you will be made to listen to a long commercial informing you about different ways to grab your money. Then you would be asked to navigate through a maze of confusing options and any error their would result in being thrown back to square one. After about 20-30 minutes, if you do get a chance to talk to a real person… then the moment you open your mouth, they will say “Sorry, this is a wrong help desk… please chose .. blah blah blah” and before you know you will be back to listening their advertisements and recorded announcements.
If after half an hour or so you do finally are able to get in touch with the right person… then go ahead treat yourself. However, please do not ask them any questions, because those incompetent SoB are not there to help you.
What is triggering this post?
Well on 10th of Oct, I made this big mistake of depositing a high value USD cheque at one of their drop boxes. Being an international financial instrument, the date of issue on the cheque was in standard USA’s month/day/year format (10/01/07) and not in the country’s proprietary day/month/year format. Hence ICICI bank did not forward it to the issuing bank, but returned it to me.
A pardonable mistake… but the only problem was that instead of taking 1-2 days to notify me about this… the bank took 33 days. By this time I not only lost interest on my amount, but also lost more than 5,000/- because the USD weakened and the exchange rates moved in unfavorable direction.
Who should be blamed:
Fool me one, shame on you.. Fool me twice shame on me. 🙁
Inspite of the repeated messages and signs I need to be out of my mind to continue troubling the ICICI Bank with my banking needs.
My mistake. Sorry ICICI bank, I will never trouble you again.
on a lighter note… here is how ICICI call center works
15 replies on “ICICI Bank Cheques”
You are not the only one frustrated with ICICI bank.I have heard many other people complaining about it.
Ankur,
A lot of them have told me about the problems they face with ICICI bank. But I have not heard the stories.
Appalling!
Should we blame the education system?
Voracious Blog Reader
i agree and what surprises me is that ICICI is considered to be the biggest and the most modern bank of India…. I have been banking with Citibank for 3 years and they never ever gave me a chance to complain. (and i do transactions of a substantial amount every month)
Citibank:
But exorbitant charges right?
Voracious Blog Reader
no way… i do not know from where do people get this misconception….
the only charges one has to pay are 100/- debit card annual fee… but the beauty is that the bank is designed in such a way that you can do almost everything without ever stepping in one of its branch (and they charge you if you do)…. but their service and promptness delights one’s mind.
However I have an brokerage account in Smith Barney (also from citigroup) and there each stock trade costs me around 2000/- (plus currency exchange charges of about 1000/-).. and that is really expensive… 🙁
I have lost my temper at the ICICI bank people several times.
Their ATM’s malfunction all the time. One has to slide the in cards in and out several times at some ATM’s. yesterday I got my new card and they said use the old PIN. I did and guess what happened? My card got blocked! So I went to the bank. They said it was my fault as I had punched in the wrong PIN. I said no no no but they wouldn’t believe me! Then another ICICI employee quietly took me aside and said, this happens, they have many complaints!! He said just change your PIN! Thats what I did today.
and still the bank not only survives, but also thrives.
LMAO!!
how ironiclly true, in ma case im ‘the other guy’ 😛
yes icici fills peoples hearts with disgust
but still they own an account- why so?
go figure
ankur it was ur fault all ur fault u relied on a brand promoted by bachan – a person who wears immaculate suits but has no clue about banking -or business sense- jokes apart
this is basic stupidity dont ever put a high value cheque evver in a drop box -especially a offsite dropbox i follow that policy very rigorously
@ammar…
i also like the way dilbert summarizes all our problems.
@prax…
//but still they own an account- why so?//
maybe because as vbr was mentioning, we have a mindset that big shops and MNC banks are always expensive… although from my own personal experience states a totally opposite view.
i was doing that for Citibank for the past 3 years… and that never failed for me… i do not know whats the problem with ICICI.
you yourself have interacted with HSBC… so you know the difference in the service quality.
the mindset is there but not out of nothing
during the control days the foreign banks did charge a tonne now that rbi has decontrolled the whole charges thing all the local and pvt banks have also ramped up their charges
secondly not all foreign banks are that great
i have dealt with stanchart and hdfc not hsbc and sometimes their service is even more lousier. it always helps to know ur manager personally. if not a email to the ombudsman or cr dept or cgm is always effective isnt it?
i find the service of a hiterio unknown coop bank like nkgsb way better than most of the pvt and psu banks
it also depends upon the staff and how cooperative they are
– plus the outsourced staff of big banks is kinda useless they are paid less and overworked and they just dont care!
control days is a 2 decade old story.. who cares about it any more?
today a good bank is one which does not expect you to visit its branch, or call its call center… basically one that values the customer’s time
Well its the same case with most of the banks, i faced problems with my cheques at HDFC bank many times.
I use online banking for most of my transactions. That saves time and there is less possibility of error as no human intervention is involved !!!
welcome to Enagar 🙂
yes online transactions is preferred by the bank also because it does not require any manpower/book keeping errors also it takes the load off from the bank branches and hence reduce the company’s rental expenses.
net bkg is great and no diff than regular bkg as u do get docket nos and at least transactions show up instantly
ofsite bankg and drop boxes are dreaded conveniences
something ankur realised a bit late