State Bank of India (Canada) | General comparisons | Discussion forum

With State Bank of India (Canada) perputually offering the very highest rates on one-year GICs; I just finished filling out, the State Bank of India (Canada) online Term Deposit Application, sending it to them along with a cheque for $100,000 from the primary bank I have been dealing for the past 30 years, requesting a simple one year GIC!

Turns out that the simple online GIC application was mere sucker-bait. After my application and cheque arrived, I got two calls from Bank of India, telling me that their online application for a GIC failed to come even close to their GIC requirements. So I asked them what other online forms were required. They told me that none of of their online forms were adequate for a GIC investor, and that they would have to send me a special set of forms to be completed and returned. While old, but still not entirely senile, at the outset, I smelled a rat! I asked them, that for the sake of simplicity, that they return my $100,000 cheque along with the additional papers!

Well . . . a couple days later, I received an eight-page fineprint contract, amongst a number of other outrageous agreements holding State Bank of Inida harmless, agreeing to entirely and absolutley absolve the State Bank if India if my funds were to be stolen, merely "lost", or otherwise mysteriously disappear at the hands of any of their employees or any other agent they had chosen to represent them ; whether bank, financial institution other (non CIDC) scam into which they had chosen to transfer my funds!!

Having spent a few decades of my career in law, I wouldn't touch one of those State Bank of India contracts, even if they offerred me 30% per year!!

The only other financial institution to perpetrate this same kind of scam, is ING; who seems to most closely emulate State Bank of India with their multipage page contract designed to appeal to unfortunate suckers who can't read!

After a 30 year law-career, the plain reading of the State Bank of India and the ING thing, is crafted to contract out of, and bypass the guarantees of the CDIC.

Buying a GIC from a legitimate source is not really all that complex: Give them your name, address, and social security number, then it's a simple uncomplicated routine transaction.

But if they demand that you sign a multipage, smallprint contract as demanded by State Bank of India or ING . . . . run for your life!!