The importance of having accurate contact details in your mutual fund folios

Fund houses communicate with their customers via emails and mobile text messages or calls. But many of us change our phone numbers frequently. We also use different email IDs; many of us even register our office email IDs. When we change our jobs, we forget to update our email IDs.

Why do mutual funds need our email IDs and mobile numbers? Isn’t that private information?

Your fund house sends you all communication of your investment transactions, new product roll outs etc. over email. If you buy or sell units, the fund house sends you an SMS on your mobile phone. O get a physical statement via post. That’s why you need to keep your contact details updated with your fund house at all times.

Further, you also get your common account statement (CAS) from depositories – one of NSDL or CSDL – on your email ID. Your depositories too take the email ID registered with your demat account and send you the CAS. Hence, it’s crucial to keep your contact details updated.

What else does my mutual fund require my email ID for?

Mutual funds also send routine communication such as scheme fact sheets, changes in expense ratio etc. to your email ID. Alerts on transactions such as upcoming/completed SIPs or allotment of units are also communicated. Material changes such as scheme mergers, changes in operational policies are also communicated from time to time to the investors over email. Many fund houses also generate investor education content, which is sent to your email and mobile. When you change or update your nomination, your fund houses sends you an email.

Email is the first line of communication for your fund house.

What if I have not registered my email ID and phone number?

Your fund house still has your postal address. It will then send you all the communication by post. Just like in the olden days. The challenge is that you do not get your post instantly. It could take days. Second, you may not check your post box regularly and may miss some important communication.

I have registered multiple email IDs over the years across mutual funds and a demat account. What do I do?

It always helps to have a single email ID and a single phone number registered with all your investments. For instance, if you have one email registered with your demat account and multiple emails with your mutual fund accounts, your CAS (the one that depository sends since you have a demat account) will take your email ID registered with your demat account.

What if I do not have a demat account? I have several mutual funds in which I have invested over the years. And I have multiple email IDs registered across all of them. To which email ID will my mutual funds send me the CAS?

If you do not have a demat account, then your mutual funds collectively will send you a single CAS. Now, if you have multiple email IDs registered across mutual funds, the email ID registered with the respective fund house where you have made the last transaction will be used. This might get confusing if, say, you do a transaction this month with one fund house and with another in the next where you have another email registered. Your first CAS will then go to your email ID registered with the first fund house. The second will be sent to your other email registered with the second fund house the month after.

Hence, it makes sense to have only one email ID and one mobile phone registered across all your investments.

How do I update my contact details?