HDFC's own August document: ₹3,500 to replace a metal card, 1.75% on rupee-billed foreign spends, $27 a head for Priority Pass in India

Most devaluation coverage runs on what the outlets pick up. This one runs on the bank's own paperwork. HDFC Bank's Most Important Terms and Conditions document carries the note "Updated on 28th August'26" at the top of page 3, and version 4.7 is dated August 2026. Reading it end to end turns up three charges that got almost no coverage when they landed, and one of them is the largest single card fee we have seen from an Indian issuer.

₹3,500 to replace a metal card

Under "Reissue of Lost, Stolen or Damaged Card", the MITC states two figures:

Read that ratio again. Replacing a metal card costs 17.6 times what replacing a plastic one costs, for what is, from the customer's side, the identical event: you lost the card, you need another.

The bank's framing is "secure processing, monitored dispatch and handling". That may well be a real cost. It is also a charge most people will only discover at the exact moment they are least able to argue about it, which is the day the card went missing.

If you hold a metal card, this is now part of its running cost in a way it was not before. On the HDFC Infinia, a single replacement is more than a quarter of the annual fee.

The DCC markup is 1.75%, and it is separate from your forex fee

From 15 May 2026, HDFC levies a 1.75% markup fee on any transaction carried out in Indian currency at an international location, or at a merchant located in India but registered overseas.

That second clause is the one worth re-reading. It is not only about being abroad. A merchant physically in India that is registered in another country and bills you in rupees puts you inside this fee. Plenty of online subscriptions fit that description.

This charge sits on top of whatever your card's foreign currency markup already is; the MITC notes that foreign currency markup fees are clubbed and shown as one entry on the statement, which makes them harder, not easier, to audit line by line.

The defence has not changed and is still free: when a terminal or a checkout page offers to bill you in rupees instead of the local currency, always decline. Dynamic currency conversion has never once been the cheaper option.

Priority Pass inside India now costs $27 a visit on the Regalia family

The MITC is explicit about this, and it is the clause that quietly rewrites what "complimentary lounge access" means on a mid-tier card. For Regalia, Regalia Activ, Doctor's Regalia, Regalia Gold, Tata Neu Infinity, Business Regalia and BizPower:

• All lounge visits within India using Priority Pass are charged at $27 in INR equivalent plus taxes, per person, per visit.
• Visits outside India beyond the complimentary cap are charged at the same rate.
• Every guest is charged at that rate too.

So on these cards Priority Pass is a membership that gets you into a lounge, not a membership that gets you in for free at home. We are not going to convert $27 into rupees for you, because the MITC prices it in dollars and the rate moves; what we will say is that at any exchange rate of the last twenty years, two domestic visits on the Regalia Gold cost more than the card's entire annual fee.

The same section also confirms the international Priority Pass membership on Regalia Gold, Regalia, Regalia Activ, Business Regalia and BizPower is not automatic: the customer has to request it via phone banking, and a minimum of 4 transactions must be completed on the card before applying.

The ₹150 to ₹200 change, in the bank's own table

We covered the Regalia Gold earn cut in August from outlet reporting. HDFC's customer mailer now confirms it directly, and shows the change is far wider than the three cards that got written up. From 15 May 2026, reward points that accrued in multiples of ₹150 accrue in multiples of ₹200 across roughly forty products, including Regalia, Regalia Gold, Regalia First, Regalia Activ, Diners Privilege, Diners Premium, Diners Clubmiles, All Miles, Superia, Solitaire, Times Platinum, Platinum, Titanium, Gold, Freedom, MoneyBack and Money Back Plus, plus the Business and Biz range.

The mailer is equally specific about what did not change, which is worth knowing before you assume your card was hit:

• No change to reward accrual on Infinia Metal, Infinia, Diners Black Metal, Diners Black and BizBlack.
• No change to cashback or CashPoint accrual on Millennia, Tata Neu Infinity, Tata Neu Plus, Swiggy, Paytm, PhonePe, UPI, Marriott Bonvoy, IOCL, Shoppers Stop and the other co-brands.

If your card is a points card in the middle of the range, the denominator moved and your earn rate fell. If your card is a top-end points card or a cashback co-brand, this particular change passed you by.

The 1% category fees, with their real thresholds

The MITC also states the thresholds on HDFC's 1% transaction fees, which are usually reported without the numbers that decide whether they apply to you:

Education spends are the interesting one: 1% applies to education paid through third-party apps such as CRED, NoBroker or Cheq, and does not apply when you pay the school or college directly on its own website or at its POS machine. International education transactions are not charged either. The fee is avoidable by changing where you pay, not what you pay.

What to do

Check whether your card is metal, and price a lost card at ₹3,500 rather than at nothing. Stop letting overseas terminals bill you in rupees, because HDFC now charges 1.75% for the privilege on top of your markup. And if you were holding a Regalia-family card for the lounge access, work out what you actually pay per visit now, because on these cards Priority Pass inside India is a paid product.

Our card pages render every fee and waiver figure from the verified catalog rather than from marketing copy, and Polo Match ranks cards by net annual value after fees, which is the only number these changes really move.