Card Protection Services in India:Competiton will bring out the best

In my last blog, I wrote about Card protection services in India. You read that there could be an interesting competition between CPP Card services & One Assist in future. In this blog, I am going to write about what I have monitored within few days. But first, let me give a brief about these companies.

CPP India is a part of CPP Group Plc, which is headquartered in UK. CPP India started in 2008 to cater assistance services to Indian consumers. This company is spread across entire world. Below is their revenue & operating income across various regions:

	North America	Southern Europe & Latin America	Northern Europe	Asia Pacific
Revenue (in million pounds)	45.8	44.4	249.5	6.5
Operating Profit (Loss) (in million pounds)	6.9	10.6	33.6	(2.2)

 

From above table, you could see that CPP is currently having losses in Asia Pacific Region. This region covers countries like India, Singapore, Malaysia, and China.

One Assist has been started by two Indians, who saw an opportunity in assistance services market in India. It is funded by Sequoia Capital India & Lightspeed Venture, who invested $3.5 M.

The question is why these companies think that India could be a profitable destination. First reason is that India is a developing country, which is in process of becoming a developed nation. In this process, people of this country might start relying heavily on plastic cards for payment as it is the case with people of developed nations. In India, it is still not the dominant means of payment, people of this country have just started relying on plastic cards. So, it is expected that there could be modest growth in demand of financial cards in India.

Secondly, this market is still in very nascent stage and a there is huge potential, provided Indian consumers are made aware of these services.

Now, here comes the interesting story of what I have noticed in past few days.

You would agree that face of any company is its website.

When I wrote my last article, I went through websites of both these companies and found out that while there is a provision to purchase products online in One Assist portal, but the same provision was not available in CPP India website. Also, the website of CPP didn’t look very promising. However, CPP Malaysia had option to purchase products online. I thought if CPP wants to do good business in Indian Market, then online purchase option needs to be given to consumers. To my surprise, when I saw CPP India website few days later on, it was given a complete face lift. There was an option to purchase their products online. They were also showcasing their tie ups with various banks. This was a great improvement in their website that I liked. But still there is a scope of improvement in their wbesite.

Later I called call center of both these companies to enquire about their products. I was greeted very politely by customer executives of both these companies. Both of these companies explained & offered me assistance services for cards. CPP said that they could get my PAN Card reissued (in case of loss/theft) without any extra charge, while they said they couldn’t provide replacement of driving license though. However, One Assist went one step ahead and said that they could provide DL & PAN card reissued (in case of loss/theft) without any extra charge. Also, they said One Assist could provide assistance services for smart phones too.

When I asked if I wish to purchase their products how I would be able to purchase it, below is the response from their Customer representatives:

CPP Call center executive:  We can help you with your purchase process and you will be able to complete your purchase on call itself. They asked me my credit card details & I said I don’t use credit cards; however I have a debit card. To this they said, we cannot process your debit cards on call. You will have to connect to your bank. I wondered whether they are aware of recently introduced debit card payment processing on their portal or not.

One Assist Call center executive: We can help you with your purchase process, but it can be done online. Here, they didn’t have any purchase process on call. When I asked I would like to do this purchase on call itself as I am not very comfortable with online payment. To this they replied, we have Cash or Cheque pick up service too. If you wish, I can help you with that.

Overall I felt that One Assist Call center executive was more aware of various processes and was able to influence me to purchase its product. CPP executive was also polite, but if he says that please contact your bank if you want to purchase through debit card, then of course they have lost one potential customer or they have not succeeded in promoting their company identity.

At this point in time, it is very important for these companies to enlighten Indian consumers about these services. The next important thing is to have as many payment channels available for consumers to complete their purchase process. Last but the most important point is to have an excellent service.