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Your First Credit Card Story - How did you get your first credit card?

TechnoFino

Founder
TF Family
Founder
Admin
Hello every,
The first credit card is special for everyone. We all remember the experience of getting our first card 😃
Let's share our first credit card experience...
My experience-
My first credit card was ICICI HPCL Coral, which I received in 2015. My home address at that time did not fall within any bank's serviceable area, so they asked me to apply for credit card against FD. But I needed an unsecured credit card, so I talked to my branch manager and I told him I needed an unsecured card.
He told me that... we can give you an unsecured card but for that you have to purchase an ICICI Prudential Ulip policy of Rs. 2 lakhs (minimum).
At that time I desperately needed a credit card because my business was in USA and I needed a credit card for its payment. I was unemployed that time with zero CIBIL score, No bank was offering me a credit card so I had purchased a policy of two lakh rupees at that time and got my first ever credit card ICICI HPCL coral credit card (chargeable), later icici converted that card to a lifetime free hpcl coral credit card and I'm still holding that one 😄
 
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minhazuddin

TF Premier
VIP Lounge
Got a random call claiming to be from IDFC First bank employee, offered LTF card and narrated unlimited features of the cards which I was not able to grasp any of it as I was new to Credit Card. Proceeded ahead with documentation and got multiple calls from same employee who trained me to say the bank that I had physically provided documents. Did same as instructed. Got the IDFC Millennia card. My first credit card journey thus begun. I'm not going to close that classic guy even if I don't use it
 
It was in 2001.
One AMEX agent came to our office in CP New Delhi to meet one of my senior. My senior asked whether I can get a card. I had just started a year back as a fresher. Had absolutely no idea about use of credit cards. Got a Green card (upgraded to Gold a few years later).
Later just showing that card I got 3 more Visa & Master cards
 

Paradjanov

TF Buzz
Jan 2008. HDFC Silver Card it was, with a CL of ₹ 15,000. LTF. I didn’t even have a Savings A/c with HDFC then; and the bank (Axis) with which I actually had both a Savings and a Current account—and a Loan A/c—declined to give me a CC, even after my repeated requests.

So, that was my first CC: HDFC Silver. I “grew” upwards with it till Regalia level, which I obtained in 2016. But then…nothing kept happening any further. I was offered upgrades which only HDFC would have the gall to call an “upgrade”, each of which I deemed worthless, and thus declined. My CL kept increasing bit by bit…and hit ₹ 15 Lakhs in 2021, where it got stuck (for whatever reason). Declined a FYF Infinia and a FYF DCB as well (both in 2021, some months apart). Anyone here may actually feel that I’ve been stupid to have declined a FYF Infinia…and I wouldn’t argue the point. Perhaps I had been. Perhaps I ought to have accepted the offer. Perhaps I did make a mistake there. Agreed.

Anyways, less than a week back, I did accept the Infinia, and it arrived fast enough. My Regalia was MC, so the default upgrade was MC too; but I requested for a Visa Infinia. Meanwhile, HDFC had dispatched the MC Infinia even before “seeing” my request, so they are now re-sending the Visa variant.

Sixteen years with HDFC CC(s), which is not just my first, but even my primary card, and has always been so. At times I love it, at times I fume at it, but it’s a fact that I’ve never parted ways with it. Legend has it, that these days, even marriages don’t last as long.
 
Once upon a time, when you had to fill printed form, take xerox copy of salary slip and people had not heard much about credit score, I got a credit card through an agent who came to our office. StanChart and Citi was two players who used typically issue credit card. I got a stanChart card!! Things got dramatically changed in next 3 years as ICICI and HDFC start pushing
credit cards
 
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Riya

TF Ace
My first card was ICICI HPCL coral card in 2020...
It was a pre-approved offer... The mails were stuffing my inbox for almost 6 years...
So just to give it a try, I took the bait and got the card with 30k limit...
Limit was pretty low as per my expectations but they were generous with LEs, now its 5L in less than 4 yrs... And it was start of my CC journey 😀
 

raghu.rokda

TF Ace
My first card was ICICI HPCL coral card in 2020...
It was a pre-approved offer... The mails were stuffing my inbox for almost 6 years...
So just to give it a try, I took the bait and got the card with 30k limit...
Limit was pretty low as per my expectations but they were generous with LEs, now its 5L in less than 4 yrs... And it was start of my CC journey 😀
Very good…..riyan parag 🙂‍↔️
 
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