Rupee On Time Charges About 635% a Year. Its Own Loan Document Says So.

Rupee On Time, an app operated by Vrinda Finlease Ltd, an RBI-registered NBFC, carries an effective interest rate of about 635% a year. That figure is not an estimate made by a borrower, and it is not one we calculated. It is documented in the lender's own loan paperwork.

What 635% a year does to a small loan

A rate like this is rarely shown to a borrower as a yearly number. It is shown in the smallest unit available - a percentage a day, a flat processing figure, a single repayment amount on a screen next to a button that says Accept. Annualised, that is about 635%.

Taken as a simple annual rate, 635% works out at a little over 1.7% of the borrowed sum for every day the money is outstanding. Left outstanding for a month, the cost alone is more than half the amount borrowed. Left outstanding for a year, the interest alone would come to more than six times the sum borrowed.

For a salaried borrower in Bengaluru, that is the figure that turns a small short-term loan into a debt that outruns a salary. A rate at this level does not principally punish default. It punishes time. A few days of slippage - a salary credited late, a medical bill in the same week, a repayment that failed because a phone had no data - is not a small slip at 635% a year. It is a materially larger sum owed by the end of the week.

That is where the second loan comes in, and it is the real mechanism of harm on any short-tenure product priced this way. The repayment falls due before the borrower has the money, so the money is found somewhere else: another app, a colleague, a family member who now knows. The first loan closes. The obligation does not. Nothing about that sequence requires a single aggressive phone call. The rate does the work on its own.

Disclosure is a duty. It is not a defence.

Vrinda Finlease Ltd is registered with the Reserve Bank of India, and lending by a registered NBFC is lawful. The RBI does not set one hard numeric ceiling on what an NBFC may charge. What it does instead is attach duties to the number, and those duties are the ground a borrower can actually stand on.

• The Fair Practices Code requires an NBFC's board to adopt an interest rate model - taking in the cost of funds, the margin and the risk premium - and to apply a stated approach to gradation of risk. The rate must be communicated to the borrower as an annualised rate, precisely so that a daily or monthly figure cannot obscure the real cost. The RBI separately directs NBFC boards to lay down principles and procedures so that excessive interest is not charged.
• The Digital Lending Guidelines of September 2022 require that the all-inclusive cost of a digital loan be disclosed as a single Annual Percentage Rate in a Key Facts Statement given to the borrower before the loan is signed, and that nothing may be charged that does not appear in that Key Facts Statement. The lending itself must be by a regulated entity. Disbursal and repayment must move directly between the borrower's bank account and the regulated entity's, with no third-party pass-through pool account in between.
• A cooling-off period is also required under those guidelines. Within it, a borrower may exit the loan by repaying the principal and the proportionate APR, with no penalty. The window is short - a day or a few days depending on the tenor - which is exactly why it matters to know it exists on the day you take the loan, not a fortnight later.

So the question a borrower can put, in writing, is not whether 635% is permitted. It is narrower and much harder to deflect: which board-approved interest rate policy produces this figure, and was every rupee of the cost set out in the Key Facts Statement before acceptance. Those are questions the RBI's own framework obliges a regulated lender to be able to answer.

There is a second question worth asking in the same letter. If money was deducted at the point of disbursal, the interest should still be running on what actually reached the bank account. A borrower is entitled to see the arithmetic that connects the sanctioned figure, the amount credited, and the total finally demanded.

What a borrower can do today

None of this needs a lawyer, and none of it costs anything.

• Get the Key Facts Statement and keep it. Ask the lender in writing for the Key Facts Statement, the sanction letter and the full repayment schedule. A regulated lender is required to have given you the first of these already. Save the app's in-screen disclosures as screenshots too, because screens change and PDFs do not.
• Do the two-number check. Put the amount that actually landed in your bank account next to the total the app says you owe. If the second number is not explained line by line in the Key Facts Statement, that gap is the substance of a complaint, not a grievance about the rate being high.
• Confirm who the lender actually is. An app is not an NBFC. Look up the entity named in your loan agreement on the RBI's register at sachet.rbi.org.in. If no registered entity is named anywhere in your paperwork, report that on its own.
• Complain to the RBI. File at cms.rbi.org.in. Raise the grievance with the NBFC first and give it thirty days; if the reply does not come or does not satisfy you, escalate through the same portal. Attach the Key Facts Statement and your bank statement. Conduct in recovery is within the RBI's remit as well, and its Fair Practices Code bars practices that humiliate or intimidate a borrower or breach their privacy.
• Report threats to the police. If a recovery contact threatens you, reaches your contact list, your employer or your family, or if your phone data has been taken, that is a matter for the police. File at cybercrime.gov.in or call 1930, and keep the call logs and messages. Under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, criminal intimidation is an offence regardless of whether a debt is genuinely owed.
• Do not clear it with another loan. At a rate of this order, a second app-based loan taken to close the first does not end the debt. It moves it, enlarges it and doubles the number of parties holding your data.

Why we are naming the company

The rate above comes from Rupee On Time's own loan documentation and from the RBI's published framework. It is not drawn from an anonymous complaint or an allegation we cannot see. We name Vrinda Finlease Ltd because somebody searching this app's name at eleven at night, before they tap Accept, deserves to find the annualised figure rather than an install page. We do not link to the app, and we will not: sending a reader who is already short of money one click nearer to it would defeat the only purpose this article has.

Right of reply: Vrinda Finlease Ltd has a standing invitation to respond. Any correction, any board-approved interest rate policy it wishes to place on record, or any statement it wants to make will be published in full and unedited alongside this piece. Write to editor@oquilia.com.

Evidence · redacted copy to be published

Rupee On Time loan document indicating an effective annual percentage rate of about 635%

Your rights, and how to report

The lenders in this series are RBI-registered NBFCs, bound by the RBI's Fair Practices Code: no recovery calls before 8 am or after 7 pm, no contacting your employer, family or references to pressure you, no abuse or threats, and the all-in APR must be disclosed in the Key Facts Statement. Read the full plain-English guide on Oquilia's loan-harassment help page.

To report a lender: start at RBI Sachet, escalate unresolved complaints to the RBI Ombudsman (CMS) after 30 days, and report threats, harassment or data misuse at the National Cyber Crime portal or on 1930. Keep every screenshot, email and call log - that record is your evidence.

More from this investigation

• Toofan Loan: 269 borrowers exposed in one email
• Subhlakshmi Finance: ~190 borrowers exposed in CC
• PaisaOnSalary: the alleged emails to a borrower's colleagues

Frequently asked questions

Is a Rupee On Time loan legal in India?

Yes. Rupee On Time is operated by Vrinda Finlease Ltd, an RBI-registered NBFC, so the lending itself is lawful, and the RBI does not set a single numeric ceiling on what an NBFC may charge. That is not the end of the question. The documented effective rate of about 635% a year comes with duties attached: the RBI's Fair Practices Code requires a board-approved interest rate model, requires the rate to be given to you as an annualised figure, and directs NBFC boards to put in place principles so that excessive interest is not charged. The Digital Lending Guidelines of September 2022 require the entire cost to be disclosed as one all-inclusive APR in a Key Facts Statement before you sign, and nothing may be charged that is not in it. So the answerable questions are: which board-approved policy produces 635%, and was every rupee of the cost in the Key Facts Statement. Ask the lender in writing, keep the reply, and if it does not come within thirty days or does not satisfy you, complain to the RBI at cms.rbi.org.in with the Key Facts Statement and your bank statement attached. If recovery turns to threats or contacts your family, employer or phone contacts, report that separately at cybercrime.gov.in or on 1930.

Can a loan app call my office or family?

No. Under the RBI Fair Practices Code, recovery agents may not contact your employer, family or references to pressure you, may not call before 8 am or after 7 pm, and may not use abuse or threats. Approaching your workplace or contacts to shame you over a loan falls outside lawful recovery, whatever an app's agreement says.

How do I report a loan app to the RBI?

Start at RBI Sachet (sachet.rbi.org.in). If the NBFC does not resolve your complaint within 30 days, escalate to the RBI Ombudsman through the Complaint Management System. For threats or data misuse, use the National Cyber Crime portal (cybercrime.gov.in) or call 1930, and keep all screenshots and statements.