varkey
TF Select
ICICI had launched a product called b2 branch free banking sometime in 2008/2009. This was a completely online zero balance account with no branch access, and had a different netbanking portal, and no debit card. I had opened an account in Feb 2009, and was using it for a while. The account numbers start with 9. It was a half baked product with many issues and bugs, however, it provided a virtual prepaid card (which was accepted for international transactions etc) which was useful for me at the time.
Anyway in Sep/Oct 2021, ICICI sent an email saying they are shutting down the b2 product and said my account would get migrated to a regular ICICI savings account with debit card and regular internet banking on a specific date. This also went fine, however they had dispatched the debit card to some old address. Since it was a zero balance account with free debit card I thought why not just keep it. Visited an ICICI branch and submitted new KYC details, got the address updated and also got the debit card re-dispatched. The linked mobile number was different, so I got that updated to the same one as that of my other ICICI account/cards etc. However, this caused UPI to stop working for my other accounts. Re-fetching the accounts only showed the new migrated b2 account. Same issue with iMobile. I had also raised a request to link this converted account to the same customer id as my older accounts/cards, but each time it gets rejected saying the converted account is still tagged as Direct Banking/b2 so its not possible to link.
So I changed the mobile number of the converted account to an alternate number and things were fine, however still not able to use a common UPI app.
Some days back, I thought of revisiting this issue and raised new requests for linking, which got failed for the same reason. Emailed customer card, and they responded with same boiler plate answers which didn't make any sense (on similar lines as its direct banking so can't be linked). I re-iterated that the account was converted to regular account with normal netbanking and things like that, but again no response.
I first tried to escalate the SR to Level 2 through https://nli.icicibank.com/NewRetailWeb/complaint.htm, but that didn't work. So I opened a new complaint through the same portal. Some days later, sent an email to myrm@icicibank.com which seem to directly get directed to the RM, and not the usual customer care route.
Got a call back in relation to the customer care SR, and was told, that I need to visit a branch to fix it. Since I was in no mood to visit a branch, I asked them to escalate internally and get this fixed, as the migration to regular ICICI account was not initiated by me, and if that caused an issue, it needs to be fixed by ICICI backend itself. I sent them a copy of the email I got as well.
Now today the RM called and connected to the deputy BM, and she checked the account and said apparently the "status code" for this account is set to "Direct Banking" which is probably causing the issue, and again asked to visit a branch to fix it. I said I have no clue what the status code is, and this is strictly internal to ICICI bank and hence should be fixed from your end. She didn't seem inclined to do anything other than me visiting a physical branch as the status code update needs a signed request apparently, so I said okay and disconnected the call.
So my questions are
Anyway in Sep/Oct 2021, ICICI sent an email saying they are shutting down the b2 product and said my account would get migrated to a regular ICICI savings account with debit card and regular internet banking on a specific date. This also went fine, however they had dispatched the debit card to some old address. Since it was a zero balance account with free debit card I thought why not just keep it. Visited an ICICI branch and submitted new KYC details, got the address updated and also got the debit card re-dispatched. The linked mobile number was different, so I got that updated to the same one as that of my other ICICI account/cards etc. However, this caused UPI to stop working for my other accounts. Re-fetching the accounts only showed the new migrated b2 account. Same issue with iMobile. I had also raised a request to link this converted account to the same customer id as my older accounts/cards, but each time it gets rejected saying the converted account is still tagged as Direct Banking/b2 so its not possible to link.
So I changed the mobile number of the converted account to an alternate number and things were fine, however still not able to use a common UPI app.
Some days back, I thought of revisiting this issue and raised new requests for linking, which got failed for the same reason. Emailed customer card, and they responded with same boiler plate answers which didn't make any sense (on similar lines as its direct banking so can't be linked). I re-iterated that the account was converted to regular account with normal netbanking and things like that, but again no response.
I first tried to escalate the SR to Level 2 through https://nli.icicibank.com/NewRetailWeb/complaint.htm, but that didn't work. So I opened a new complaint through the same portal. Some days later, sent an email to myrm@icicibank.com which seem to directly get directed to the RM, and not the usual customer care route.
Got a call back in relation to the customer care SR, and was told, that I need to visit a branch to fix it. Since I was in no mood to visit a branch, I asked them to escalate internally and get this fixed, as the migration to regular ICICI account was not initiated by me, and if that caused an issue, it needs to be fixed by ICICI backend itself. I sent them a copy of the email I got as well.
Now today the RM called and connected to the deputy BM, and she checked the account and said apparently the "status code" for this account is set to "Direct Banking" which is probably causing the issue, and again asked to visit a branch to fix it. I said I have no clue what the status code is, and this is strictly internal to ICICI bank and hence should be fixed from your end. She didn't seem inclined to do anything other than me visiting a physical branch as the status code update needs a signed request apparently, so I said okay and disconnected the call.
So my questions are
- Did any of you have an ICICI b2 account in the past? Is it still operative?
- If yes, did you have issues in linking the account to existing ICICI customer id or accounts.
