Safety · Updated 21 October 2026 · 8 min read
A loan scam usually starts with certainty. The message says you are already approved, the rate is the lowest in the country, and the money will arrive as soon as you pay a fee or share a one-time password. Legitimate lenders still have to assess you. They do not need your banking password to do that.
Patterns worth refusing
- An upfront fee to “release”, “insure”, or “process” a loan that has not been sanctioned by a named lender.
- A request for your card PIN, net-banking password, or an OTP that arrived from your bank.
- A demand to install a screen-sharing or remote-access app.
- Pressure to stay on a call, keep the offer secret, or pay from a friend's account.
- A lender name you cannot match to a real company, or an app that is not the lender's own.
- A promise of approval for everyone, including people with no income.
What a comparison site should look like
A comparison can explain costs and take an enquiry. It should say that the lender decides. It should not pretend a published table is a personal offer. On this website a short-term row repeats a figure the brand has published, and an enquiry stays in the demo environment. No SMS one-time password is sent, because no SMS provider is configured.
Zup Loans will not ask you for Aadhaar images, PAN images, bank passwords, or banking OTPs in the marketing form. If a page that uses the Zup Loans name asks for those, leave it and use a site you typed yourself.
Before you share anything
- Check the legal name of the lender, not only the app icon.
- Read whether you are dealing with the lender or with a platform that passes your details on.
- Ask for the key fact statement and the total amount payable.
- Keep copies of what you consented to, and what you did not.
- Stop if the only way forward is a payment to a personal account.
Where to report
The Reserve Bank of India publishes its current directions and a Sachet portal for complaints about unauthorised acceptance of deposits and suspicious financial schemes. Start at rbi.org.in and sachet.rbi.org.in. For cyber fraud, use the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal at cybercrime.gov.in, and tell your bank immediately if money has moved.
Those are public reporting routes. Zup Loans is not the Reserve Bank of India, and a complaint to Zup Loans does not replace a report to your bank or to the authorities.
Written by Zup Loans editorial desk. Specialist review is still pending before any live publication.