HDFC Bank — Savings account cadre degradation without prior intimation or consent & then giving a bizarre reason for the same

I have been an account holder with HDFC Bank for quite some years. More recently, my classic banking account was degraded from that to a normal savings account. Despite fulfilling all the criteria for it to maintain that grade.

When I approached the concerned branch manager, he deputed the task to a subordinate staff member to check with the product team. Over one month passed, I did not get any response from the concerned. I then sent out an email to the BM along with a few other people. Only then did it elicit a response from the other branch staff who was addressed in the mail, though was not the one given the responsibility by the BM first.

I asked for two things – why was my account degraded & from when. While I got the accurate response for the ‘when’, I was later baffled when I learnt the meaning behind what was provided to me for the ‘why’.

I was told my account was moved from classic to normal as a result of Credit Card delinquency of my late father. I tried reasoning with them in detail over email as to how does an ‘X’ product of A customer affect the ‘Y’ product of B customer! Then also got involved myself in uncovering the actualities with the credit card team over email.

I learnt that there were actually no dues or arrears from the date that my account had gone below the original status. These were only bank charges levied even after the bank had been informed about the demise of my father by my own-self to the very same branch staff member.

The credit card team informed me that the card had been blocked much before the degradation of my account but was permanently invalidated only much later. Whose fault is it then that the charges were still levied despite being informed of the demise of the credit card holder? On what basis did the concerned staff member come up with the reason that it was ‘credit card delinquency’ of my late father? Is not the bank professional & understanding enough to accept its own responsibility?

Why do they want to dump their error, in whichever capacity, on two account holders who had been loyal to the bank until then?

I request for a written apology letter from the concerned staff for diluting not only my account but also the credibility status of my later father, when there wasn’t any.