The Hindu Business Line : Credit card (mis)adventures

Last week, I was walking down the aisles of this huge retail outlet in Phoenix Mills, Mumbai. Bachelor readers will agree shopping is not a simple task and it takes years of training before one can actually tell which of the over 3,000 varieties of dals on sale is actually supposed to go into a dal tadka. Normally, there is just one type and it will be right at the end of the shelves near the coriander. Or is it dhania? Or are both the same?

Anyway, I was clumsily pushing along my cart when I ran into an old friend in the ready-to-eat food section - he was bending over one of the lower shelves, looking highly distressed. He was a friend from business school who worked for one of those big private equity firms. We quickly hugged each other and decided we must continue the rest of our shopping expedition together. The ordeal would be more fun and, besides, he knew all about dals while I was a whiz with the dairy products and the cooking media.

"You must try some of this imported Camembert cheese," he said plucking a baseball-sized lump from the cooled shelf. I would have done so merrily, I told him, if only it was not so expensive. He smiled broadly and half twisted his torso around as he pulled his wallet out of his jeans pocket. He opened it and pulled out a thin but glittering piece of plastic. "My new corporate credit card. A `gold card'. Almost unlimited spending power. Buy abundantly today and pay in luxury later. Got it last night. You must get one," he said. He had the panache of one who had arrived in the corporate world going by his broad smile and the way he brandished his latest possession. Undoubtedly, a corporate credit card is one of the great luxuries of today's young managers. No MBA should be without one.

It is a joyous day when the thick little courier packet is delivered to one's desk at the office. One rips open the cover with much alacrity to find a little letter from the company and stuck with light adhesive in a corner is a sliver of smooth plastic in the name of a `Mrs Vanessa D'Cruz'. This, of course, takes a few days to sort out as the credit card company has lost the application form the company had filled out in your name and required `only your signature.' They ask you to return dear `Mrs D'Cruz's' card and to fill out a new form so that they can expedite the right card in your name.

"I get reward points when I buy anything which is redeemable against a wonderful catalogue of gifts and luxury products you know," my friend said as he dropped three bottles of Nutella into this trolley. A week or so after they receive your form, they do something known as address verification. This involves a burly young man, with way too many forms to fill, shadowing you around for a week trying to find out how many other people work in your office, whether you have a washing machine at home and (I swear I saw this on a form) is your house locality `high-class, respectable, middle-class, others.' I show him my Godrej top-loading and he nods gravely. "Bas 5 litre capacity? Only three auto programmes? Hmm." "Of course, I also get discounts in most of the top restaurants in Mumbai you know. You should come sometime to the Zodiac Grill at the Taj," my friend declared. He gleefully picked up a bottle of premium white wine from the new wine store in the corner. I thought twice and decided against the one-litre carton of orange juice.

One would expect the card company to issue a corporate card quickly enough to someone working with a big firm and drawing a very fine salary indeed. But no, they still ask you to fax across a copy of your salary slip for verification. You say ok and on the 300th try, the fax machine beeps and the sheet of paper zaps across. In the evening you get a call from a local public sector fertiliser company. The voice tells you they have received a fax with your salary details and don't know what to do with it. Finally after a week you lose patience and call the call centre. You give the pleasant lady your application number. She asks you to wait for a minute. "Yes sir. We have received your application. It has been approved and the card is on its way. I am sorry for the inconvenience Mrs D'Cruz." You put down the phone in a huff.

"I tell you, you must apply for one of these things. Life is simply impossible without one of these cards. You never need to carry any cash you know. I am sure even freelance writers can get one," my friend suggested. I nodded and promised I would try to get one. At the cash counter, I pay in cash and wait for him at the end of the line. The cashier swipes his card twice and then frowns. "Sir your card is not valid. There seems to be some problem. Do you have another card?" My friend loses the colour on his face rapidly. Ten minutes later, we walk out with our shopping and he now owes me a considerable amount of money. He immediately dials the call centre standing outside the store. I hear him shout and gesticulate. "The idiots!" he says. "They have messed up everything. Apparently the card was issued in error. And my actual card has been sent to some woman in Dadar. A Mrs D'Cruz. Do you know her?"

(The writer, an alumnus of IIM-A, was a management consultant before quitting to work on a book and a full-time writing career.)

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