Amongst the various eligibility criteria for credit card, the most important one is the annual income of the applicant. Based on your income, banks will decide whether to approve or reject the credit card. Higher the income, higher will be chance of getting the credit card and higher would be the credit limit. And banks do this, to evaluate whether the person is credit worthy or not. This is applicable for both salaried and self employed. However there are also credit cards for low salaried individuals.

But what about unemployed or jobless individuals, can they get credit card? Answer is YES. There are two ways, unemployed individuals can get credit card:

1. Against fixed deposit
2. Add-on card

Credit card against FD:

For this, you need to keep certain amount with the bank as a fixed deposit. The limit would be 60%-100% of the amount kept in FD account. So if you want higher credit limit, then amount in FD should be also be high. And all the benefits offered on the normal card such as reward points, cash back etc. are aso applicable for cards against FD. These are also called as secured credit cards since you are depositing money as a security in the bank. Although banks offer a grace period for making the payment, remember to pay the due amount on time, this is because a default payment would land you in trouble as your credit score will be impacted. And too many late payments would result in various charges which banks will recover from the FD account and most importantly the chances of future credit card or loan application rejection will increase.

However, there are certain requirements for credit card against FD as follows:

• Deposit amount: Every bank has minimum amount required to be kept in the FD account. For e.g. Kotak Mahindra Bank asks for Rs. 25,000, ICICI bank asks for Rs 20, 000.
• Tenure for the deposit: Banks also require minimum tenure for the FD account. For e.g. Kotak bank requires 1 year, ICICI bank asks for 3 months.

Here are few of the banks offering credit card to unemployed:

• ICICI Bank: Coral Card
• Axis Bank: Insta Easy Card
• Andhra Bank: Signature Card

Check out this post on list of banks offering credit cards against FD.

Add-on credit cards:

If any of your family member already has a card with a good credit score then a jobless individual can get add-on card on his/her name. But remember that, add-on cards can only be given to the card holder’s spouse, children, parents, and siblings. Benefits offered on such supplementary cards are similar to the offered on the primary or original card i.e. if the primary card has 2.50% fuel surcharge waived off then supplementary card will also have this fee waived off, also these cards are issued mostly for free. Also note that the credit limit is less or can remain the same as that of the primary card.

However late payment could impact credit score of the primary card holder as well. So never miss a single payment.

Apart from unemployed individuals, credit cards against FD and add-on cards are the best recommended for the college students, freshers, housewives, and self employed. This is because these cards do not require income proof and most importantly banks do not check credit score of the applicant, repayment history etc. (except add-on card).