I was using CRED for over a year. I had
heard about it from some friend and checked it out. The mobile app had a unique
proposition: it allowed us to pay all credit card bills from single interface
and it also gave some offers and ‘cash-backs’. When I logged into CRED for the
first time, the app had already pulled one of my credit cards there and it was
surprising (read scary) to me because of data privacy concerns. Still I listed
my other credit card and thought to give the app a chance.
An interesting thing to use in CRED
is the “CIBIL Score”. It is our credit score and using CRED we check our score
for free any time. And then there were offers. When we pay credit card bills,
we earned ‘coins’ which we can use to buy offers with discounts. I took a Uber
coupon initially and later on I was not able to find any good offers. Most of
the offers of up to 50% discounts were from unknown niche brands. I did not want
to buy a new brand just because it offered discounts. Hence I started ‘encashing’
my ‘coins’ (reward points). But as per the algorithm, the cashbacks were very
less. Mostly those were like only Rs 7 or 14. I waited for a few months and
then gave up. I decided to quit CRED for a simple reason. The risk reward ratio
was too less.
Whenever we install a new app, there
is always a risk. Financial apps would definitely pose more risk. We are giving
away important data like our credit card bills pattern every month and what
kind of offers we are taking. It helps create a customer profile where the company
can know us well. And then it can target ads to us and also if there is any
data leak or data may be unethically sold to other companies. For paying credit
card bills, very simple methods already exist – auto debit from net banking is
one, or we can choose to pay a card from net banking of any bank. Therefore
since the rewards were not attractive enough and the risks were high, I decided
to quit. CRED team was helpful and they deleted my account after my request.
But before I deleted my account, I
converted whatever unused ‘coins’ I had for charity. I converted the coins into
‘saplings’ which would be planted by CRED on my behalf. This is a noble feature
from CRED.
My advice would be that if you are
finding the CRED offers useful and if you are using those offers very often,
then you can keep using CRED. Otherwise I am not in favor of giving away our
data to any financial app which is not necessary and can be avoided.
- Rahul Tiwary
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