HSBC Premier credit card - too good to be true?

[Chicken]

Moved back to HSBC about 12-18mths ago, and there was no waiting period or payslips required - got Premier instantly. Even opened the account whilst travelling interstate.

Well, a friend who had never used HSBC in Australia signed up last week on the HSBC AU web site while overseas, then had to do the mobile phone ID check (which was a PITA, too many fails). Account number was generated immediately, and they sent $9001 into their new HSBC account immediately.

ATM card arrived this week, with the word Premier printed on the card.

I had the same experience as BJ, was 5 months into qualifying and another poster going through the same process mentioned they walked into branch and asked if they could get their qualification expedited due to their deposit history and also wanted to apply for a premier card, they obliged..but not for me (I wasn't even recycling a deposit into my account) so depends on who you get at the time. The following month after knowing I passed the 6 month hurdle asked again and was approved for both premier and the card.

Guess it's more important to get new customers than retaining existing customers. Standard practice in the finance sector

All I need from them is to set Australia as my home country, upgrade my account in the host country to Premier, and find me an RM there. It's difficult to open a business account in the other country I'll operate from; hence the mucking around to upgrade to Premier.

This is also the reason I told my friend above to open Premier with HSBC. They tried to open the "HSBC Premier" transaction account in Hong Kong. HSBC in Hong Kong is telling people on their web site, to open an account using their app and only takes 5 mins. It took my friend multiple attempts, as the app kept halting the application and saying they need to go into a branch. They tried tweaking the answers they gave to the questions, until the application got saved, and the app told them that the application will be reviewed. The next day, she got an e-mail from "hsbc.co.in". Seems like our old mates changed job, from working as customer service in Citi, to being relationship managers in HSBC