Amex in credit card tie-up with Indian Overseas Bank

The India branch of American Express Banking Corp has signed a distribution tie-up with Chennai-based public sector bank, Indian Overseas Bank (IOB), to provide its credit card services through the latter's distribution network.

Based on the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the two banks, the co-branded platinum and gold charge credit cards of American Express would be distributed to the premium and high-end customers of IOB. The co-branded card will have the logo of both IOB and American Express, and would be available for the customers from May 1, 2011.

“We have a full slew of payment systems established in India. We are looking at expanding our franchise in India. Considering the strength of Indian banks and the growth of economy in the country, we expect the tie-up would give a push to our existing growth,” said Shailesh Baidwan, country manager and head (consumer cards business), American Express Banking Corp.

IOB has so far issued 37,000 cards across the country and 11,000 out of this were for high networth customers. “We are targeting to cover 500,000 high networth customers this year, and the tie-up with American Express will be a booster to our growth plans,” said M Narendra, chairman and managing director, IOB.

The platinum card comes with an annual fee of Rs 10,000 and a life time fee of Rs 50,000. The gold charge card, with an annual fee of Rs 4,300, would be free for customers joining through IOB for the first year.

The average spending on American Express cards in the country has seen a growth double of the overall average spending on credit cards in India, said Baidwan.

The average spending on our cards were at Rs 1.5 lakh in 2010, more than triple the size of the overall average spending, which is at Rs 40,000 in the country, he added.

The growth on the bank's average spending on cards is double of the growth of ovarall growth of average spending on cards, which was at 15 per cent in year 2010, he said. At present, it targets the premium and high-end segment customers with an annual income of Rs 8 lakh and above.