Alert for credit card, debit card holders! Big RBI announcement, here is how you are affected

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has extended the timeline for certain provisions of master direction on credit card and debit card- Issuance and Conduct Directions, 2022. The information was provided by RBI on Tuesday, June 21, 2022 in a notification. Banks and NBFCs issuing credit and debit cards have got three more months (till October 1, 2022) to comply with certain norms including activation of cards without consent of customers, no capitalization of unpaid charges/levies/taxes for charging/ compounding of interest, among others.

“Considering various representations received from the industry stakeholders, it has been decided to extend the timeline for implementation of the following provisions of the Master Direction to October 01, 2022,” RBI said in the notification. It can be noted that the stipulated timeline for implementation of the rest of the provisions of the Master Direction remains unchanged.

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The provisions of the Master Direction that has been extended to October 1, 2022 are:

1. Paragraph 6(a)(vi) – Card-issuers shall seek One Time Password (OTP) based consent from the cardholder for activating a credit card, if the same has not been activated by the customer for more than 30 days from the date of issuance. If no consent is received for activating the card, card-issuers shall close the credit card account without any cost to the customer within seven working days from date of seeking confirmation from the customer.

2. Paragraph 6(b)(v) – Card-issuers shall ensure that the credit limit as sanctioned and advised to the cardholder is not breached at any point in time without seeking explicit consent from the cardholder.

3. Paragraph 9(b)(ii) – No capitalization of unpaid charges/levies/taxes for charging/ compounding of interest.

As per the Master Direction, card issuers must seek One Time Password (OTP) based consent from the cardholder for activating a credit card, if the same has not been activated by the customer for more than 30 days from the date of issuance.