ICICI to launch white label credit card

New Delhi: A white label credit card can have loyalty alliances with even 100 partners. It does not carry on its face the brand of the issuer, as against a co-branded credit card which has the logos of both alliance partners.

ICICI Bank is launching a white label credit card in association with Loyalty Services and Research Ltd (LSRL), a company formed by a group of venture capitalists.

The credit card will be the same as the one launched by State Bank of India (SBI) and Tata Sons in February 2006.

The white label card will be launched in about a month with ICICI Bank as the card issuer bank and Loyalty Services and Research Ltd (LSRL), managing the loyalty programmes. "ICICI Bank has a minor stake in the LSRL," said Madhivanan B, ICICI Bank’s general manager, retail asset products group.

He, however, declined to give the exact stake the bank will hold in LSRL.

A white label credit card does not carry on its face the brand of the issuer, as against a co-branded credit card which bears the logos of both the alliance partners. Also, a while label credit card can have loyalty alliances with any number of partners. The number of alliances could be as high as 100, Madhivanan said.

ICICI Bank is also in the process of launching a private label credit card for home-makers for use at Big Bazaar outlets. The credit limits on this card will be very low ranging from about Rs 2,000 to Rs 3,000.

These initiatives come as the largest private sector bank has crossed a credit cards base of five million. It is adding as many as three lakh credit cards every months and is now way ahead of the number two credit card issuer, Citibank, with 2.9 million cards.

ICICI Bank is trying hard to push use of cards, including debit cards, outside the top eight cities and for this has rolled out 1.55 lakh point-of-sale (PoS) terminals. It plans to add another 1.5 lakh PoS terminals in 2006-07 to provide facilities for use of cards in smaller towns and cities.

Almost 45 per cent of the cards issued by ICICI Bank are in smaller cities and towns, but they account for less than 30 per cent of the card spend.