IKEA joins hands with Mastercard, Citi for credit card

The in-store card application process is digital with instant verification and immediate usage, a first for any co-branded card in India

Hyderabad: IKEA, Citibank India (Citi) and Mastercard have jointly launched ‘IKEA Family Credit Card by Citi’, which provides instant in-store card bookings, direct payments via Bharat QR, reward points and EMIs. IKEA has a co-branded credit card concept in many other markets across the world.

The credit card is available to IKEA Family members at ‘zero joining fee’ and ‘zero annual fee’ and can be used for purchases made on IKEA’s online and offline stores, or anywhere in the world that accepts credit cards. The option is available to both salaried as well as self-employed.

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Together with Citi, IKEA has secured an EMI option for the customers that extend from 03 to 48 months. The in-store card application process is digital with instant verification and immediate usage, a first for any co-branded card in India. Customers can simply apply for the card when they visit the IKEA Hyderabad store or leave a message on the IKEA website expressing an interest to apply.

“Affordability is an important initiative for IKEA. If you look at home furnishing, there are multiple different product areas within home furnishing. Many times, people buy accessories and furniture once or twice a year and people buy homes once or twice in their lifetime that they need to furnish. The new initiative will support customers in terms of having the money to spend on home furnishing,” Kavitha Rao, country commercial manager, IKEA India, told Telangana Today.

She added, “Now we all know how the home buying market works in India. You normally are taking a home loan and top up loans are not very easily available so often customers who bought a home, end up with a major challenge when they have to furnish the home and the credit card scheme that we are offering right now gives us the option for these customers to be able to almost use the card like a top up loan and to be able to furnish their new homes.”

Instant process

When a customer who walks into the Hyderabad store and decides to opt for this card, it will be available by the time they are at the checkout because the process is almost instant. Both the credit scores as well as the information related to the customer as well as the KYC gets done instantly and there is an option of a QR code basis which the customer can use the card for payment.

“We are hoping that in a couple of months after this, we will be able to transition to a video KYC process, which means the online option also gets enabled,” she informed.

This credit card is not just used at IKEA, one can use it across a range of merchants and in the process earn points, which they can then decide to use at IKEA. She further added, “In Hyderabad we have close to about 4,00,000-5,00,000 customers who are part of the IKEA Family Membership Programme and we expect overtime, a significant chunk of that membership base that will actually look at taking the IKEA Family Credit Card as well.”

B2B customers

IKEA also sees a huge opportunity when it comes to partnering with builders and looking at new homes because in India in general, it is seeing big growth.

Rajeev Kumar K, senior vice president, Market Development, South Asia, Mastercard said, “The IKEA Citibank Mastercard Credit Card we are launching is a retail consumer focused credit card.  Based on the demand from IKEA B2B customers, in future we will evaluate the need for a B2B-focused credit programme. Also note, issuing credit cards and setting credit limits are the prerogative of the issuing bank, which is Citibank in this case.”

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