I am setting up my Net Banking with HDFC, which is the bank I use when I am in India. In general, Indian sites suck, and HDFC is no exception. I have not registered my account yet, and already I have found two things that have turned me paranoid about the integrity of the site. Hence, I am liveblogging my experience as I continue through this endeavor. HDFC, this entry is a very valuable resource for you. I would love it if one of my customers gave me a play by play on PoP Circle or PoP Project. If you read this entry take it as a customer who is interested in seeing you improve. And please improve.
An aside, I do wonder why sites set up for the Indian consumer are so bad. Vodafone (http://www.vodafone.in/Pages/index.aspx --I had a problem with this some time back but now it is much improved. Kudos, Vodafone!) and Airtel (http://www.airtel.in/wps/wcm/connect/airtel.in/airtel.in/Home --Yes, this is the home page. A bajlllion characters long.) are no exception. An honorable mention for a pleasant experience for Indian customers is Cleartrip (http://www.cleartrip.com/). A beautiful interface that I would very much like to discuss with Hrush and the people responsible. (Hrush, drop me a line I am at diwantvaidya at paradigmpop.com).
Here is my HDFC usage liveblog.
First, I am greeted by a set of 'important notices'. Important notice number one, "Beware of fraudulent emails." Ok, that is true. Good. Important notice number two, "Click here to buy movie tickets." What the hell? I was expecting important notice number three, "A Nigerian prince needs your help. Click here to find out more."
Next, and very scary is their Verisign logo. It is a horrible resolution gif. I immediately suspected the site to be a phishing attempt, and after confirming it wasn't, my confidence was still shaken. Here is what they have (the extra width and height attributes are included exactly as on their site and are what make the image look horrible).
Here is the one on mint.com:
Third, it asks me for my customer id. I have never logged in before. I do not know what my customer id is but I infer that I must have to register it somewhere before I get started. There is no text on the page to help me out except 'get a new Net Banking Pin' which I don't want to do because I have a paper from the bank with my pin already on there. Grumble grumble.
Looking through the FAQ for more info about customer id, but nothing here. Instead, I found, "What do you mean that the transactions are "Real-Time online"?" which translates to, "Why is Net Banking so awesome?". I find it hard to believe that is a frequently asked question.
The stupid demo starts after having logged in. Gorramit.
Looked through the brochure I was given when I started the account. Found a grammatical error and a an answer that didn't really help but sounded like something the announcer on Springer would say. The error was, "HDFC Bank NetBanking is a "VeriSign certified"". I guess we get to fill in the missing noun. I am going with bison. HDFC Bank NetBanking is a "VeriSign ceritified" bison. The non-answer (in the Springer announcer voice), "Note: Your Account Number is not your Customer ID". Good, that narrows it down and I am so grateful.
I am starting to think that this customer id is a device to weed out those who think they want to use Net Banking from those that really want to use Net Banking.
Dug up really old papers from when I first opened the account (papers I still have because I am a pack rat) and found my customer id! Yes! I totally prefer this to having it in my well-indexed email account. Or to registering for a customer id online. Sarcasm is not picked up in 70% of written communication so let me clarify. That whole process sucked. Email this stuff to me. Or let me re-register online within 2 minutes. You can do that now with the internet and technology.
An internet keyboard for typing in the PIN to bypass key sniffers. Cool, confidence grows slightly.
Ok logged in, saw my stuff. I am done with this site for today, I will get to actual account stuff later. Time for a stiff drink. Barkeep! Raspberry tea on the rocks!
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