This New Year Gift Your Sweetheart Jewellery WITHOUT PAYING NOW

I know females are going to love this…and some guys obviously hate, but I thought I should tell you about this. The other day I was just surfing through offers on credit card and found this one interesting.

HDFC Bank has tied up with Gili to offer its Credit Card Holders EMI Purchase of Jwellery. This is a 6-month EMI option and you know what I liked the most about this? Bank has clarified upfront that this offer has no extra cost and there are no hidden charges.

However you need to take care of a few things. I am listing the important terms and conditions in a simple manner below:

A. Offer is valid till 31^st December, 2011 only

B. Card has to be swiped on an HDFC Bank Swipe machine

C. Offer is available at select outlets. So before you go out my friend, check the list to avoid wasting time, petrol and yes a fight with your girl. ;). No…you don’t need to search it I am giving the link below for you (Say Thanks to me…LOL)

HDFC Gili EMI Offer

Happily, there doesn’t seem to be anything else that I should warn you about, but I would still advise you to read the Terms and Conditions given on above link for the safer side.

Interestingly there are other Credit Cards who have similar offers, but I didn’t find them good enough for two reasons:

They have a processing fee or an interest charge

The merchants that they have tie-ups with don’t have all India outlets

For your benefit, I am here giving the link of EMI offers on 4 other most popular cards

1. ICICI Bank Credit Card EMI Offers (Clcik to read details)

Gives you option to shop online, at retail outlets. Visit this link above and/or call ICICI Bank.

2. SBI Flexipay (Clcik to read details)

Gives you the option to convert your Purchases above Rs. 2500 into EMI for 6, 12, 24 months with 2% interest per month charge. You have to inform the bank within 30 days of purchase. Click on link above for full details.

3. Citibaknk Split It (Clcik to read details)

Gives you the option to convert your Purchases above Rs. 2500 into EMI. Interest rate charged and other conditions not specified. Click on link above for additional details.

4. Standard Charered EMI Card (Clcik to read details)

Standard Chartered has an EMI card which gives you option to convert all purchases above Rs. 2000 into 24 monthly installments. It doesn’t charge a processing fee or a pre-closure fee. The interest is charged at a rate of 2% per month. For every Rs. 1000, you pay an EMI of Rs. 53 for 24 months.

But before you make Her/Her Highness happy, you must see if you would be able to pay back in 6 months or not as it is only a credit facility and you must maintain a healthy credit score lest you are declined a personal, car or home loan.

And hey Girls, c’mon you can gift him a Gold/Diamond accessory too!!!. By the way, there is no restriction on buying it for yourself as well. 

---*Happy New Year*---

A BLACKBERRY 3G PHONE AT 52% DISCOUNT..WHY YOU SHOULDNT BUY IT

You are looking to buy a phone….see how you are being fooled

When I opened TOI this morning, saw an offer which said…THE TIMES OF INDIA Reader's Offer...BlackBerry Storm 9530 with 3G.

The offer says…

BlackBerry Storm 9530 with 3G For Just ` 19,990 `9,499/-

So what do you think the reaction of a wise person should be:

'Oh my god, wow…they are giving BlackBerry at half the price, its worth a grab

Or

'Why are they giving it at half the price'

If you fall in the first category, then you NEED to know more. Well, even if you are in the second category…you WANT to know more…RIGHT???.. J

Okay, I guess the simplest thing from my experience is good things never come cheap…atleast with a more than 50% discount and accompanied by gifts too….sounds too good to be true…there has to be a catch behind!!!

So I just browsed through the ad and called up indiatimes shopping number. And I was only waiting to be proven shockingly right…here's why:

1. God!!!, the phone was LAUNCHED 3 YEARS BACK….IN SEP, 2008…..so the first thing that comes to your mind…these guys are dumping old junk claiming to be giving you a sexy offer…..well for that matter rediff shopping is offering it at even lesser at 8990…I checked a couple of other websites, they were giving it in even lesser price.
   


2. The other thing why I consider it junk is I read several reviews which complained about battery issues.
   


3. BlackBerry Storm 9530 is supposedly a 3G phone…with only 128MB RAM….is that a joke. Even ordinary phones nowadays have memories 3 times that (512MB) or higher. You can imagine how fast the phone will run, I doubt if it can run streaming videos.
   


4. Phone has only 65,000 colours…again the same thing. Normal phones have colours around 256,000, forget about the latest ones with 16Million (or 1.6 crore colours…285 times more colours). So the photo and video display is gonna be any great.
   

   I have put above two points particularly because these guys are pitching it as a 3Gphone…but 3G requires much better configurations in memory and colour for good audio/video content.
   

5. BlackBerry storm 9530 doesn't even have wi fi..so you can't hook on to free speedy internet at office, coffee shops, airport and other public places.
   


6. Beware of A-GPS support…it means the phone doesn't have its own internal GPS
   and you will have to cough up additional money to buy a separate GPS device and hook on the phone to that. And the BlackBerry Map listed in the features are meaningless, cuz BlackBerry doesn't provide maps for India yet.
   

What may lure you to this 'Blackberry Storm 9530 with 3G at 52% discount offer' in terms of the features…and but must be evaluated follows:

1. It has BBM…buy a normal internet-enabled phone and download one of many products that offer you yahoo, msn, facebook, icq etc in one single messenger like Nimbuzz etc. Or if you are a BlackBerry fan, buy one with latest technology and better features.
   


2. 3.2 MP camera…so what many phones have it or even better camera.
   


3. Push e-mail…nothing really exclusive of BlackBerry any more…many phones offer this.
   


4. Six-months warranty by Third Party Vendor…Only 6 months??? Remember its an old phone…just 6 months warranty and that too by Third Party Vendor, not by the company is useless in my opinion.
   

So guys, in this amount of 9499, I bet you can buy many latest phones with several hot features and better/newer technology.

Before buying, shortlist your requirements from a phone….compare the features in other phones in that price range…and find out how old or latest is the technology.

If the discount range is 5-10 %...whether at a website or a newspaper or your vendor, its surely worth a look.

The Golden Rule

All in all-remember….GOOD THINGS NEVER COME AT 52% DISCOUNT…..so if there is any such offer…..ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS (upto the power n) find out more…..or simply IGNORE

FREE MOVIE TICKETS ON CREDIT CARD !!!

You are a movie buff and book your tickets online?.

If ever in future, you login to a movie ticket website to book tickets as the cinema location suits you and your eyes sparkle to an advertisement banner saying ‘GET A FREE TICKET WITH YOUR VISA CARD*!, HOLD yourself before jumping with joy. Look at the asterisk that points to ‘TERMS & CONDITIONS APPLY’.

I have here decoded the offer and its ‘Terms and Conditions’ which are not written upfront and are in a legal format not easily understood by all. Let me simplify it for you:

1. The offer is valid on a certain category of cards viz Platinum/Signature Cards or maybe Visa/Master Card/American Express.

2. Always check the offer period i.e. an offer may be valid only till a particular date. It is possible that the website ad banner is yet to be removed while the offer has expired.

3. Very Important, there may be a maximum limit of Free Tickets per Credit Card during the offer period sometimes as low as 2-3 tickets per quarter. So if you are thinking you can take your whole group to movie at half the price, sorry to disappoint you. It also means, if you are planning to watch a new movie every week at 50% , it doesnt really happen that way.

4. Tickets per day and per show are limited, so book early. So even if you have the said card you may still not get the free ticket, as the limited number of tickets that were available may have already been taken. After you enter your credit card details at the time of booking tickets, system will throw a pop up expressing regret that the free tickets are not available or will say congratulations...your amount is reduced to half. But remember the convenience charge will not be halved.

5. Offer may or may not be available in certain categories of tickets i.e Silver/Gold/Platinum

6. Read this..the One Free Ticket shall be given out of every two tickets` purchased in the same purchase transaction. Thus, if a customer books 4 tickets in a single transaction, he will need to pay for only 2 tickets, as the other 2 tickets will be free. However, if the customer books 3 tickets, he can avail of only 1 free ticket then, and has to pay full price for the other 2 tickets. The offer is not available if only 1 cinema ticket is booked.

7. Tickets once bought in this offer cannot be cancelled, refunded or exchanged. The only way is to go at the cinema hall at the show timing and sell them near the ticket window, but this may lead to petrol and time expense. So book only when you are sure

8. An offer maynot be combined with any other offers/discounts/promotions.

Nevertheless, let me wish you all the best and hope that the seats quota isnt exhausted.
Have a good Move Time!!!