Bandhan Bank offers VISA int’l debit cards, invites NRIs to open accounts

Bandhan Bank will now offer VISA international debit cards and NRIs will also be able to open accounts with the bank from now, Chandra Shekhar Ghosh, managing director and CEO of the bank, said on Tuesday. 

The international debit card is being offered in partnership with VISA International. The chip-based card is EMV-compliant.  The customers will be offered two variants — Visa Classic and Visa Platinum. 

These cards will be for both domestic and international usage and have features including insurance, commercial discounts at selected merchandise outlets. VISA Classic debit card holders will enjoy a daily cash withdrawal limit of Rs 40,000 while VISA Platinum debit card holders will have a Rs 1 lakh daily cash withdrawal facility. 

The POS transaction limits for these two card variants will be Rs 1,00,000 and Rs 4,00,000 respectively. It may be mention that Bandhan Bank is the first bank to be set up in eastern India since independence. 

Ghosh said that many NRIs had approached the bank authorities to allow them to open accounts. Keeping this in mind, the facility was opened on Tuesday. 

Ghosh said that NRIs pump $70 billion into the Indian economy annually. He added that he had recently met an NRI who told him that he was willing to deposit his money with Bandhan Bank at much higher rate of interests.

“From today, the facility will be open to NRIs.” Ghosh said around eight lakh customers had been added in the past five and a half months and durings this period added up to Rs 7,500 crore. 

During the past five and a half months of its existence, 612 Bandhan Bank branches and 203 ATMs have been opened throughout the country and the target till March would be to open 632 branches. Ghosh said that many requests to open branches in rural areas had been received and the bank authorities are considering the proposal.   

Ghosh said the bank had offered loans varying between Rs 5 lakh and Rs 25 lakh to set up affordable housing and loans for two and four wheelers under OLA and Uber schemes. He said, in other cities the response was quite impressive. From three branches in Hyderabad, Rs 85 crore had been deposited. He said small depositors were most welcome as “the bank believes in the philosophy of developing the habit of saving”.