India Rising

While I was preparing for my journey, I was told horror stories about credit score. Apparently, to open a bank account, you need an address, and to get a place, you need a bank account. Duh! Even though it sounded absurd, I did not pause for a moment to question it, and was thinking how I could open a bank account.

For Indians, coming from India, ICICI has an option. You can open an account in India, and when you reach here, you have an account. Check it out. Bear in mind, that an ICICI account makes sense only if you are living in Toronto. As of now they have branches only in Toronto and its surrounding areas. Hopefully they grow into a big bank with lots of ABMs.

Wait a minute, ABM??? Well ATMs are called ABMs here. Automated Banking Machines. Here you don’t see people with cash, its all plastic money. Its either debit cards or credit cards, and you can see loads of them with everyone. I thought 2 cards was luxury, but here you have people going around with 15-20 cards. I am not bluffing, come here and see. Its funny to see people going through their card bundle to make a payment. Err.. this one, no this one.. err…

I know, I know. We were talking about bank accounts, and not someone’s plastic bin. The reason I bought it up was that, you need to select a bank with the maximum ABM network, so that you can minimize your other-bank-ABM withdrawals. RBC and CIBC supposedly have the biggest network of ABMs.

Now that the choice of bank is done, next comes the choice of accounts. I was surprised to know that there can be chequing accounts for individuals. In India, it was only for businesses. Anyways, what it means is that you can get cheques for those accounts, and the savings account is for savings. Simple eh.

To open an account, all you would need is 2 pieces of ID. One is a photo identity, and the other can be either an immigration paper or a letter from your employer. With these, two – you are good to go.

HTH.