Life Insurance Corporation of India has zeroed in on the Fortune 500, $59.2 billion company -- Capital One as its partner for foraying into the credit cum debit card business.

S B Mathur, chairman of LIC, told Business Standard that LIC had sought some special terms like concessional interest rates for its policyholders and among prospective partners, Capital One was the most agreeable to these terms. In view of this, Capital One would be making a high level presentation to LIC on Friday.

The card would also provide holders access to complete information on their policies and maturities, but this would have to done through the network of Corporation Bank. This link between card operations and the Corporation Bank would have to be built up, Mathur added.

LIC had entered into talks with three possible partners for its credit cum debit card -- SBI Card, Corporation Bank and Capital One. Officials from the public sector company said that SBI Cards already being in the business and among one of the larger card companies would mean that the card would have to be co-branded card and LIC officials did not find the idea very attractive.

With regards to Corporation Bank, officials were of the view that this being a holding bank of LIC with limited branch network, LIC would not be able to get much out of any tie-up.

The LIC board is scheduled to meet next month where a formal decision to this regard will be taken, informed officials.

The company was looking for the best deal out of the three entities with which it had entered into talks. It had put a few riders like waiver of joining fees and annual fees for card holders, reduced rate of interest advances through the card.

LIC was asking for rates that were as low as 0.9 per cent to 1 per cent per month against the existing rates of 1.9 per cent to 2.2 per cent per month. The company was also looking for value added services for its customers through the tie-up.

Stiff riders for a tie-up were in lieu of the large customer base that LIC has which prompted them to ask for waiver of service charges or nominal charges.