HDFC Bank to Launch 2 New Credit Cards in Partnership with Pine Labs

India’s largest credit card issuer, HDFC Bank is going to launch 2 new co-branded credit cards in partnership with Pine Labs which is one of the largest fintech firms in the country. Although the cards have not been officially announced by the bank yet, they have been listed in HDFC’s credit cards MITC document on the bank’s website.

Pine Labs, in December 2020, crossed the valuation mark of $16 billion to become the country’s third-largest fintech firm after Phonepe and Paytm. The company majorly focuses on the offline market providing POS solutions to offline merchants. Recently, Pine Labs also launched its online transaction platform Plural targeted at online vendors.

Pine Labs HDFC Bank Credit Cards

As mentioned earlier, HDFC is going to launch 2 co-branded credit cards in collaboration with Pine Labs- Pine Labs HDFC Bank Pro Credit Card and Pine Labs HDFC Bank Credit Card. As is obvious from the name, the Pine Labs Pro Credit Card is the more premium of the two cards.

Pine Labs HDC Bank Pro Credit Card

Although HDFC has not disclosed the details like reward rate and add-on benefits, Pine Labs HDFC Pro Credit Card is expected to be a mid-level offering by the bank. The card will come with a membership fee of Rs. 1,000 which will be waived off on an annual expenditure of Rs. 1 lac in the preceding membership year, while the first year’s membership fee (joining fee) shall be waived off on spending a minimum of Rs. 75,000 in the first 90 days of card issuance. Other fees like cash advance fee and forex mark-up fee for the Pine Labs HDFC Pro Credit Card are the same as for most other HDFC credit cards– 2.5% of the transaction amount and 3.5% of the transaction amount respectively.

Pine Labs HDFC Bank Credit Card

Pine Labs HDFC Credit Card will be an entry-level offering by the bank. The card shall come with a membership fee of just Rs. 499 per annum which will be waived off on an expenditure of a minimum of Rs. 50,000 in a membership year, while the joining fee of the card (the first year’s membership fee) shall be waived off on spending a minimum of Rs. 45,000 during the first 90 days of card issuance. Cash advance charge and foreign currency mark-up fee for the Pine Labs HDFC Credit Card and Pine Labs HDFC Pro Credit Card are the same- 2.5% and 3.5% of the transaction amount respectively. Since the pro-variant will be the more premium of the two variants, it is expected to offer a higher reward rate than Pine Labs HDFC Bank Credit Card.

Bottom Line

With the launch of the two Pine Labs co-branded credit cards, HDFC Bank attempts to leverage the large network of merchants using Pine Labs services. Since HDFC is not allowed to launch new digital products, the cards have not officially been announced by the bank. We can expect the launch of the two Pine Labs co-branded credit cards as soon as RBI lifts the ongoing embargo on HDFC. HDFC Bank earlier in 2021 announced its plan to regain its credit card customer base that it had lost due to the RBI imposed ban.