State Bank of India (SBI) Increases Processing Fee on Rent Payments Made Through Credit Cards

The State Bank of India (SBI) has hiked the processing fee for cardholders who make rent payments using their credit cards. Additionally, the bank has also increased the processing fee on merchant Equated Monthly Installment (EMI) transactions. SBI has informed its customers about the hike in processing fees via an SMS and has said that the new charges will be applicable from November 15, 2022.

The SMS sent to SBI credit card customers read “Dear Cardholder, charges on your credit card shall be revised/levied w.e.f 15 Nov’22." It further said “The processing fee on merchant EMI transactions has been revised to ₹199 + applicable taxes from earlier ₹99 + applicable taxes. Processing fee on rent payment transactions will be ₹99 + applicable taxes”. Customers who have made rent payments through their credit cards before November 15, 2022 will not be liable to pay the revised processing fees.

After the revision, SBI will now levy a processing fee of ₹199 on merchant EMI transactions, which was ₹99 earlier. An additional GST will also be levied on such transactions at the rate of 18%.

SBI is not the only bank to have put such restrictions on credit card transactions. Earlier, ICICI Bank also informed its customers that it would levy a processing fee of 1% on rent payments made using credit cards with effect from October 20, 2022. HDFC Bank also put a limit to the reward points on rent payments made through credit cards. Moreover, Yes Bank has limited such credit card transactions to twice a month.

Credit card users are allowed to make rent payments using their credit cards through third-party apps like Cred, Paytm, Mygate, RedGiraffe, Magicbricks, etc. However, they may levy a service charge for making such payments. Hence, with the increase in the bank’s processing fees and the service charges levied by the service providers, customers will end up paying a higher amount.