Tag: card

Your Duty To Vote – Never Expires!

Government Life 5 Comments

All in Bangalore, your “duty” to vote has arrived. The first step to ensuring that you can vote, is to get a Voter ID Card, also known as EPIC (Elector’s Photo Identity Card). The only catch is, you have to act fast – as the last date for getting your name on the Electoral Rolls is 22 Feb, 2008. All the details can be found here: BangaloreVoterID.org

  • You have to fill up Form 6, indicating your current residence, supplemented with some documents (for proof of age and residence – see below)
  • You don’t have to be a permanent resident of the place where you want to get a Voter ID card (you can be a tenant)
  • If you are working at a place different from your home town, you are eligible to get a Voter’s ID at your town of work
  • Please make sure to fill Form 7 to get your name deleted from electoral rolls elsewhere in the country
    • Search here to know if your name exists in the electoral rolls of your home town
      • Doing this will ensure that your name is not used to register bogus votes at your home place
  • You can also fill the same Form 7 to de-register people you know, who no longer are residing in those places (and hence can’t vote) due to migration or death
    • Please do this for as many people as you can, you will do a huge favour to the nation.
    • You can search for names in the same way as you did for yourself
  • Documents for proof of age (18+): High School Marks Sheet, Birth Certificate, Passport, Driving License or this affidavit on a stamp paper stamped by a Notary (I created this from Annexure A of the Passport Form).
  • Document for proof of residence is not necessary. But it would help to facilitate (speed up) the work of registration if you can provide any of these: Passport, Bank Pass Book (or a letter from bank), Driving License, Telephone Connection (your name), Gas Connection Documents, Employee Certificate or any Govt. document.

Update: Here is a fresh site where you can find details on deadlines and addresses of electoral registration offices.

Update (21.Apr.08): You can now drop a filled in form (with your photograph pasted on it) and get the Voter ID card within 48 hours. Check this news article from Times of India.

It is your duty to vote, not just a right any more. Please see FAQs and detailed steps on how to get a Voter ID card at BangaloreVoterID.org

Balance Transfer – HSBC

Credit Money 2 Comments

If you have an HSBC Credit Card, and you are going to do a balance transfer (BT) from another card to your HSBC card – think twice. It’s been a whole new world of rules that opened up for me when I ventured there.

Suppose you have Rs. 5000 pending on another card (say Citibank), and you want to pay this amount from your HSBC card, here is what you would do:

  • Make sure that your HSBC card is clean and you don’t have to pay them anything, prior to making this BT request.
  • Go ahead with calling them up and re-ensuring there is nothing to pay there. Give them your Citi card number and the amount (5000).
  • Take care to not use your HSBC card anywhere until the end of 3 or 6 months (whatever tenure you selected).
  • As soon as you get the draft – deposit it with Citibank.

Here’s what’s in store for you now. You see these charges on your next month’s statement of your HSBC card:


19NOV 19NOV BALANCE TRANSFER BTW 5000.00
TRF FRM CITI BANK CC # XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX
20NOV 20NOV BT Processing fees IN 249.00
20NOV 20NOV Service Tax + [email protected] IN 30.83

Seems fair enough? Well, they did tell you that there would be a BT fees (for a transfer for 3 months). Now here’s what they did not tell you (in your next statement):


OPENING BALANCE          5279.83
03JAN 01JAN Your Name VisaMoneyTXFR IN 300.00CR
12JAN 12JAN FINANCE CHARGE 16.74
12JAN 12JAN "SERVICE TAX+CESS"@12.36% 2.06

Wow, there is a finance charge of Rs.16.74 (~17) and another Rs. 2 STT! HSBC had charged you a Processing Fee in the previous month’s statement (look at the first snippet above). Now, here are the rules from HSBC:

  • Any payments you make (minimum due) would go towards completing the BT amount first.
  • As the Processing Fee was charged after the BT was given out, it’s considered as a shopping on your card.
  • Until you repay the whole 5000, there would be finance charges on that Rs. 249+30.83 @36% compounded p.a., every month.
  • As the system counts any payments only towards the BT, these finance charges will attract interest next month too.
  • So, here’s the total money you’d shell out for your 90 day BT:

    (249+30.83) + (16.74+2) + (17.48+2) = 318.05

Considering the BT amount to be 5000, this money wasn’t much. But if you did any larger transaction – you’ll be paying much more money.

Remedy

  • Call up Customer Care and ask them to reverse these charges.

    This weird system is not mentioned any where in their Terms (as of date) and also they can’t fool customers with small figures.

  • If the officer refuses to budge, tell them to transfer call to someone senior.
  • If it doesn’t help, drop a comment here and let’s make sure they mend their system.

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