ATM use - word of warning

Lexicon

Hope no-one else gets caught out with this. I have been in Hyd for about 7 months now and have been happily stuffing my visa debit card into ATM's and receiving cash - until a few weeks ago. To cut a long story short some of the UK banks (this one was Alliance & Leicester) have decided that as India is a "high fraud area" the card can only be used for a certain number of times, after which ........ nothing

So I was left high and dry with no way to access my funds, and I bank in the UK who couldn't care less.

I have got round the problem with a lot of help from various sources, but the point of the post is that I had no prior notice of this.

shashank.aggarwal

lexicon, we assume that back has not not informed us about it..but the fact is that we generally fail to read the fine print...

Its not unusual for banks to have a limitation on number of transactions you can carry out in a given period of time..

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Lexicon

Yeah - I was familiar with the concept of a certain number within a finite period, but this was final - so many and your card gives up in India for good

Aishah

This is a good post as I had no idea about this either. So far so good for me, but i don't use the ATM frequently. I think I will make an enquiry to my bank in Australia in regard to this. Thank you for posting,Lexicon.

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freenote

Thanks for the warning . The lesson to be learnt here is to try to keep your bank informed about where you propose to use your card .

Lexicon

I would not disagree, but A&L gave me the distinct impression that "a rule is a rule" and we're not changing it so ... tough

As you can imagine, I am moving my account (back) to one of the bigger high street UK banks.

Nick-H

First I ever heard of it. And I do tend to read the fine print.

I can say that the trend with UK banks over the past few years has been to manically maximise their profits, minimise their losses --- and stuff the customer.

It is ridiculous to say, "If you go to such-and-such place you can only your card n times"; utterly ridiculous, whether or not it has been clearly informed.

Did you know it takes five days to clear a cheque in UK? And that, in the days when every signature on every cheque was compared with the customer's record card, and book-keeping was manual, it took only three?

Sympathy to Lexicon here, I think this bank has been mentioned by another poster recently, or another bank in similar circumstances. That poster moved his account.

Vote with your feet!

Or, at least tell somebody senior within he bank that unless this restriction on your card is lifted immediately, you will close your account[s] with them at the earliest possible opportunity on your return to UK. Such ultimata can and do work.

One more-difficult area is that of replacement of lost or expired cards. Here I have some sympathy with the card issuer; it is their experience that too many cards are lost in transit when sent to India, and they will not do it.

I never used my visa card anyway, so I was happy to accept 'we will gladly reactivate your account and issue a new card should you return to UK'

An expiring bank debit card gave more problems, but at least they put in the necessary effort to urgently courier the replacement to a nominated friend who was leaving for India within a few days.

I haven't used my UK bank card in India for maybe a year or more. But they have my address here, they know where I am: I should be shocked if it didn't work!

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Nick-H

Nationwide. I think it is the only one that gives you free overseas use of your debit card. That's worth a lot!

Buck

I gave this answer on a similar post the other day.
I too am with Alliance and Leicester and I received an automated e-mail saying that we can only now take out 'small' amounts of cash when abroad. After a few e-mails and eventually a phone call I got them to define that a 'small' amount is £10 - £20. I asked if they could give me a higher personal allowance now that they know the dates of my trip. NO! The only way round it they said was to go to a bank or BDC and get them to phone the bank in the UK (en route to Bangalore) to clear the transaction. Needless to say that costs time and money.
Following another IMer I contacted the Nationwide and enquired about their Flexaccount. £200 a day limit abroad and no charges for the withdrawal. Appreciate it doesn't help in this case but maybe others will benefit.
Buck

Lexicon

Indeed .. A&L advised me that I could withdraw cash by presenting the card (by itself) at a local bank or Bureau de Change. After trying Thos Cooks and five different local banks, who all looked at me like I was crazy, I gave up.

Aishah

Having a card sent from another country to India is a nightmare as Nick mentioned - I lost my purse a few years back and had terrible problems replacing the ATM card. You cannot have it posted because they are stolen, my friend who forwarded it to me used a very reputable courier coy. and all was fine until it reached Delhi. It took 10 days to go from there to Jaisalmer - the whole procedure from loss of card to finally receiving it was 3 weeks of nervous tension. You can travel a day and a night by train to Delhi - why did it take 10 days many phone calls etc?? There were hold ups in both the company offices of jaipur and Jodhpur. It was not until i telephoned back to Australian office that any action was taken and produced results. I might add that you never post a card as a card - it was stuck in between the pages of one book and my friend sent a parcel of two books to me.

Drews60

Luckily, I belong to a small credit union. When family members or I travel abroad, we notify the credit card department of the dates and cities we will be visiting. They monitor transactions and cover us.

Last July my son had a bogus ATM debit (in Rome), the credit union refunded our loss of 150 Euros.

But, being paranoid, I always carry a second card from another bank to cover me if my primary card is lost, stolen, or in this case, rejected.

crowgirl

We used a Capitol One cc and informed them ahead of time that we were going to India along with our dates of travel- No problem and we used our card alot- never at an ATM but at plenty of establishments. The cc also did free automatic conversions for us so that was a bonus.

We also took cash with us and when we got to India we went to a bank with a friend and had it changed into Rupees so we could spend at will when cc wouldn't be an option.

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tacita

i periodically am unable to use my credit card -- which i use for everything, never cash, so i can maximize my frequent flyer miles to go back to india. when i call my credit card company, i am referred to "fraud prevention". when there's a lot of activity with high numbers, they freeze the account until i call and confirm the transactions.

most recently, i bought an india ticket ($1200), registered for two courses (500), dined out at an expensive restaurant ($150), purchased show tickets ($100), etc., all within about 48 hours, so that set off their radar. it's frustrating, but it's also the way of the world with fraud increasing. for that reason, i always have a visa, amex and debit card with me.

i also call my credit card company before i travel and let them know to expect foreign charges, some of them substantial, for hotels, etc., and from what country/countries.

i mention this because it's possible that the OP's card was frozen for her protection and that it could be rectified by calling the bank and validating the transactions to date. moreover, if the bank is aware that you are in india and what your expected usage patterns will be, they may not freeze the account in the future.

just a thought...

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karuna

They're barstewards in many other respects but Barclays were excellent. Too excellent, in fact. I told them I'd be leaving India for Thailand on such-and-such a date. I didn't, I stayed in India. I used my debit card in Varanasi when I "should have been" in Thailand, and the fraud department blocked it immediately. Very efficient, but irritating as hell and one expensive phone call to sort out!

When I first called them to tell them I'd be taking my card abroad, they gave me this spiel about how I'd done the right thing in telling them, very important for them to know where I was so they could check for fraud etc etc. Then asked me which countries I'd be visiting.
"Nepal, India, Thailand and Cambodia" I said
"Well you can only have two," they said.