The mastermind behind this exceptional free app is Kunal Shah, the former founder of Freecharge, who is now the founder of CRED.

As interesting as it sounds, it helps you manage your credit card dues while allowing you to track your expenses.

What is CRED?

You must have at least one person in your life that carries a tonne of credit cards that are probably not the paid ones. You can recommend that person the app, CRED as it reduces all the pressure of keeping a track of all the payment dates so they clear all their credit card dues on time every month.

Kunal shah really wanted to help people pay their credit card bills on time without charging anything from their side.

But, why would someone install an app to pay credit card bills?

Hence, he decided to reward his loyal users who pay their bills timely which they can use to shop for something from the app in future.

How Does CRED Make Money if it’s Free of Charge?

Every application collects certain personal information of their users and so does CRED. The information that CRED extracts from their users may include:

• Credit card information (brand of the credit card, number, etc.)
• Information of your monthly expenses
• Repayment profile
• Your credit score information

It determines your spending patterns and what websites your use for your online spending.

All these personal, to be more specific, “confidential” information can be beneficial to banks and financial institutions. They can use this information to offer you their products/ services as per your interests and desires.

They most probably monetize this information by sharing this with other financial institutions.

If you see the Privacy policy page of CRED, they have clearly stated that:

“Data collected about individuals spend habits (merchant preferences) might be used by them to offer customized product recommendation.”

Well, now that’s a smart move, CRED, you offer free-of-cost service while providing your customers products that they may be interested in.

But hey, is the CRED application safe?

As mentioned before, Kunal Shah, the mastermind has built the app, who was also a former founder of Freecharge for over 2 years. He wouldn’t build something that isn’t best for their ideal customers.

CRED is RBI approved and there’s nothing you should worry about regarding your financial data.

Nonetheless, if you doubt if CRED is safe or not, then be rest assured that it is Safe.

What is the Business Model of CRED?

As a new start-up owner or an entrepreneur, you’d really want to know the business model of a successful brand like CRED.

There are mainly 3 pillars of the CRED Business model:

Customers of CRED

People were used to paying their bills via their bank account or some other payment gateway but with CRED they not only pay timely bills but also get rewarded for it.

As the popularity of the brand mostly boosts with ‘word of mouth’ where their customer love the application and they recommend it to their friends and network.

The CRED application offers services backed by an AI solution that keeps a track of every single thing going on in your credit card, spend patterns, and reminds you of the due date.

The CRED Application

Customers with a credit score of 750 have access to the application and people that meet the criteria are allowed to get the benefits of this free application, CRED.

The UX/ UI design of this application is as beautiful as its offerings, it is decent but appealing to the eyes of their customers.

As you pay your credit card bill regularly with the help of applications, you get access to exciting rewards that you can redeem later on your favorite brand’s offerings.

Brands that Display offers on CRED

CRED onboards brands that are related to their industry or they can also be out of their industry. They form tie-ups with these brands to together offer the best of their offerings to CRED’s customers.

The brands that align with CRED get exposure to a wider audience, and CRED offers more to their loyal customers.

It’s a win, win situation for both the parties and customers, everyone gets benefited from each other.

Final Thoughts!

There are possibly other ways that CRED makes money, and I have tried to list down the most speculated one. Data monetization is the prime way that CRED makes money and they also partner with other brands to widen its customer base.

Kunal Shah is one of those entrepreneurs that share his opinion on his socials and has gained popularity because of his successful start-ups. CRED being one of the most effective credit card bill payment applications of all time is on its way to offer more flexible payment options and features to its customers.