The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has given banks and NBFCs three more months to implement three provisions under the new regulatory guidelines for issuing credit and debit cards.

The deadline has been shifted to 1 October as the RBI received representations from industry stakeholders. Banks and NBFCs were to implement the Master Direction on ‘Credit Card and Debit Card – Issuance and Conduct Directions, 2022’ from 1 July. 

One of the provisions on which extra time has been given relates to activation of credit card. As per the master direction, card issuers need to seek one-time password-based consent from the cardholder for activating a credit card, if not activated by the customer for more than 30 days from the date of issuance. 

The RBI had said that if no consent is received for activating the card, card-issuers will have to close the credit card account without any cost to the customer within seven working days from date of seeking confirmation from the customer.

The second provision relates to the credit card limit. The RBI had asked card-issuers to ensure that the credit limit as sanctioned and advised to the cardholder is not breached at any point of time without seeking explicit consent from the cardholder by 1 July. 

The RBI has also postponed implementation of a norm related to unpaid charges and compounding of interest by three months to 1 October. As per the master directions, there should be no capitalisation of unpaid charges/levies/taxes for charging/compounding of interest.

“The stipulated timeline for implementation of rest of the provisions of the master direction remains unchanged," the Reserve Bank said on Tuesday.