So after completing my extensive research and investigation for opening a 0 MAB account with ICICI, I have some seriously big learnings and experiences. I have written many posts on this thread and also on wealth management thread. But all in all, it is very difficult (near to impossible) to open a full 0 MAB account with 0 initial funding whatsoever.
0. Experiences differ widely across people. For the same product and same account, different people will have different experiences. Nothing can be considered as standard and applicable for all.
1. Every branch told one common thing. They have shifted their focus to affluent customers and do not encourage basic accounts.
2. Give 50k or 1L initial funding and open their so called privilege account. It also comes with: (a) family 360 where you can add your family members or (b) 3-in-1 where you get demat and trading. Both these are not mandatory.
3. Give 3L and open WM account. Maintain a minimum of 3L across all products (TRV) and retain the wealth status. Otherwise silent downgrade may happen.
4. Biggest learning of last week - Our personal investments are not counted in TRV/DIV. We need to invest through iMobile itself. This was a huge difference. I would say 98% of RMs would just say that our personal investments like direct mutual funds are counted for TRV calculation. But one BM told me clearly. It has to be through iMobile. This impacts the wm status very heavily.
5. Private banking is altogether a different beast. That will have a regional RM who will directly work with you for all your banking, investment, loans, business needs. Your net worth is counted there and everything depends on overall business you bring to the table. It can be through your employment, family, business, investments or whatever. That's not for someone who is just looking for banking needs. Normal banking is the lowest thing in private relation.
6. It doesn't matter if you hold a credit card with 10L limit or more. To open an account, you need to give initial funding. Those criteria given in the site are just to maintain a relation not to open an account.
Given all this, I have decided to open a salary account and use it as a savings account. Opening a salary account is very seamless process with no initial funding and minimal documents etc. After three months of salary not getting credited, it may be converted to savings account with some minimum balance requirement and charges for other services. But still better than going through other hassles of normal account opening.
I wanted to ask some questions as well:
1. Has anyone's salary account got closed due to non credit of salary? Usually they don't touch salary account, getting converted to normal account is also rare. But is there any chance of they closing it?
2. What are the charges after converting from salary account to normal account?
Like minimum balance, ATM charges, limits, cheque book charges, NEFT charges, SMS alert charges etc?
Thanks for the support. Tagging some people who might be interested in this:
@Anindya98 @abhiaj98 @Panthera_Tigris @hender @2025 @Fini7777 @Anupama_Jha @vijay.vj