How to Save Your Credit Score?

With the introduction of CIBIL’s CIR (Credit Information Report), it has become mandatory for loan borrowers or credit card holders to be aware of their credit usage, since any kind of lapse on your part in terms of repayment, may not enable you to acquire more debt later, no matter how mere the defaulted amount may be. Whenever you apply for a loan or a credit card, banks will look into your credit score and decide as to whether or not your loan needs to be processed or not. Therefore it is important that you maintain a good credit score.

Sometimes, there can be certain transactions that might have got unnoticed by the banks and the bank may not have made the necessary corrections. In such situations your credit score is likely to be affected. The common disputes which most credit seekers face are:

1. Transaction differing from the transaction authorized by the customer but the amount is billed to the customer.

2. Transactions billed for goods/services were not delivered as agreed upon by the seller or the customer may not have accepted them.

3. In situations where the card was under the card holder’s possession and the transaction might have been made.

4. Reversals not received by the bank on those transactions that were cancelled by the customer.

5. Appearance of unauthorized transactions/charges appearing on the card.

6. When there has been lack of communication between the issuing bank and the merchant systems, duplicate processing of a transaction can take place.

Following are the steps under which you can register a complaint for rectifying these issues:

You as a prudent customer can utilize the grievance redressal cell provided by banks and lodge a complaint through phone or by an e-mail, specifying the dispute by calling the call centre agent of your respective credit card provider, which are then updated on the bank’s website. Also, you can also consider writing to the nodal officers, whose details will be in the banks’ websites of the issuing bank, monthly statements at branches and even at ATMs.

Once you spot the error, notify the credit card company immediately and provide the details of the transaction that is in dispute by filling the customer dispute form that is available at most of the banks’ websites. Ensure that your redressal should be made within 60 days the issue has been spotted.

In order to speed up the reversal, it is best if you can gather a charge slip that is relevant before the disputed transaction took place and take it to your merchant first before the bank. Once that is done, try getting the complaint number or any receipt specifying that your complaint is lodged from the card issuing bank.

1. As soon as you spot any unauthorized transaction, verify your bank and block that credit card immediately.

2. It is important that you make a note of the monthly statements that you receive from the bank and compare them with the card usage.

3. Always forward the customer dispute form to the card issuer with the entire details specifying the disputed transaction.

It is becomes binding upon you as a customer to fully co-operate with the bank and provide them with complete details about the transaction so that the process of verifying the disputed transaction can begin quickly, that will eventually help in resolving the dispute. It is important to do so since, that particular transaction that is under dispute will be excluded, temporarily, from your amount that is lying as outstanding, and which you are required to pay to your bank.