HSBC Reviews 160

Yet another problem with HSBC, this time trying to increase my stock trading limit. I wrote to HSBC Invest Direct via their log on site, got a quick reply to ring a UK Telephone no. After 90 mins, 4 different persons including a manager, I was told my Relationship Manager in Jersey has to approve me using my money in my account. Do bank with with HSBC and they will be your mother/mother in law! Also ask you to spend loads of dosh on phone bills to do that. Sell HSBC buy BT. Mr Quinn is asking his team to get you to spend a long time on the phone. May be Sky News should check if Mr Quinn has any shares in BT :) :)

Having decided to leave the UK HSBC Expat seemed like a sensible solution as I move to Dubai and then Australia. Account opening was seamless, communication has been fantastic, my account manager is attentive and dynamic. Excellent investment advice, and competitive on currency conversion when the sum exchanged allows them to go to market. They have used the global link to efficiently open local accounts which link to my online banking.

Archaic systems all around. Customer service team is partially located in low-wage countries and is not competent to resolve rudimentary issues. Cards are routinely sent to wrong addresses. Closing and opening trading accounts (automatic with competitors like Swissquote or Interactive Brokers) takes weeks and much correspondence and can only be completed if your onshore trading account is closed. Internal referrals are a bureaucratic nightmare, even though this should be one of the advantages of a cross-national group. Removing blocks often goes wrong - e.g., for months after one block I had a visa card that completely non-sensically worked for all POS-payments, but not at any ATMs. FX rates are forbiddingly high.

I was utterly astounded at how easy it was to open the account, I expected masses of documents, Notarizations, apostle, Translations, etc.. but it was so easy and simple with very reasonable expectations with regards to the documents, the account was opened in a week.

Thinking to join HSBC EXPAT?? Think twice!
I have my funds blocked with no reason given, after 8 days still chase them to understand why my account and funds are blocked....no answer customer service are there just to say hello to you but no power to help you, and is not because they don`t want to is just because they CAN`T as they have no power, somewhere behind there are persons that with one click they make your life so miserable. Complain with HSBC seems to take forever and nobody is willing to look into this matter nor to solve your problem. Saying all this HSBC EXPAT is the worse experience i have it in my hole life!

After being an HSBC UK customer for 8 years, they froze my account for being inactive/dormant after a few months (I hadn't used it in a while), and also froze my telephone banking for some reason. I don't currently live in the UK, so could not go into a branch in person to "verify my identity".

After calling for 6 months and repeatedly asking for a letter/code to unfreeze my telephone banking (in order to then re-open my dormant account), no letter came. When I called, the customer service agents could not confirm the address they were sending the letter to for "my security", because my telephone banking was frozen. I would later find out that they were sending the letter (WITH SECURE INFORMATION) to the wrong address. But they could not tell me this. If this sounds Kafka-esque and ridiculous and illogical, trust me, it was.

I went into an HSBC US branch and begged them to call the UK bank to get my account unfrozen. After an hour on the phone, we were able to get my telephone banking unfrozen, but not my dormant account reactivated, because they have bizarre address and ID confirmation policies (what they are trying to confirm, I don't understand, because all of the addresses are easily changeable either on their website or through my other banks).

No policies are consistent. None of their staff seem to know or understand their policies for basic things like unfreezing an account. I would absolutely NEVER recommend this bank to anyone. I will likely be closing my account after I get it unfrozen (it still isn't).