HSBC Premier credit card - too good to be true?

[desafinado74]

I cannot see any mention of "Premier" on the web site internet banking either.

Premier account does not exist / not available in Australia, unlike other markets like:
- Hong Kong, where they have separate "HSBC Premier Bank Account" and "HSBC One" which seems to be our Global Everyday but on a new 21st century platform
- Singapore, where they have separate "HSBC Premier Account" and "Everyday Global Account"
- UK, where they have separate "Premier Bank Account" and traditional British style current account with no name LOL, and Global Money which seems to be their version of Everyday Global
- Malay, separate "HSBC Premier" and "Everyday Global"
You get the drift.

After application, my friend got an e-mail with the word "Premier", and the ATM with "Premier" on the front (see photo in my previous post). That's all. No snail mail.

I don't think there is such a thing as global status, as the web site of every country would only say that you can get status if you already have status in another country.

My friend who just joined HSBC AU brand new 3 weeks ago is actually in Hong Kong physically, and been trying to use the Premier status in AU to open "HSBC Premier Bank Account" in Hong Kong for the last week. The only benefit that the Premier AU status had provided so far, is the privilege of e-mail and sending documents (including her plane ticket, yeah, WTF does a plane ticket has to do?!) to HSBC India back and forth.

Yes, it's India, because the e-mail signatures are "Global International Banking Centre – Hong Kong" with the e-mail addy <[email protected]> on behalf of <[email protected]>

My friend had since been asked to go into a branch in Hong Kong to get it sorted.

The privilege of having status and benefit of "Open an HSBC Premier Bank Account ...... in less than 5mins"

Thank you for your long reply.
I just called HSBC Premier Australia and they have made me a Premier customer. But i won't be receiving a Premier ATM card until the current card expires

You are right. Premier status in Australia is a ho hum / Boring affair compared to other countries. (No Relationship Manager, separate account etc)

Do you have Premier accounts in other countries ? I am planning to open one in Malaysia and Singapore (The Singapore one needs employment details, i wonder if they need hardcopy of payslips etc, as i am currently between jobs and not working)

Please update here with regards to your friend's HK application situation.

 

[Viridis]

I would call it nothing.

Or an abuse of the intent of the requirement. Having said that, it may not be - it may just be a proxy for income and they don't care what you do. I think - but haven't checked - that the UK bank wants your salary paid in to the Premier Account. They really can't control what happens after that, so same thing essentially.

The current requirement for UK is:
- annual income of at least £100,000
- savings or investments of at least £100,000
These are not easy to meet.
I am not sure if your old requirement of £50k is deposit balance, or just deposit tranaction, which is what Australia is asking for.

Yes, it is now - as it said previously, this just brings them into line with other UK High Street banks; but the HSBC website also states ...

If you opened a Premier Account, or submitted your application for a Premier Account, on or before 4 September 2024, the previous eligibility criteria will still apply. These are: (1) an income of £75,000, and hold another eligible product, or (2) have £50,000 in savings or investments with us, or (3) hold and qualify for HSBC Premier in another country or region.

 

[Chicken]

Do you have Premier accounts in other countries ?

Not me, I don't use HSBC, as HSBC AU is part of HSBC Hong Kong, and HSBC HK has to comply with requests from the Hong Kong government, and they have complied with political crackdowns by freezing and taking people's money, so, no, no HSBC for me, as I don't know if I'm also blacklisted / wanted by Hong Kong government.

I am planning to open one in Malaysia and Singapore (The Singapore one needs employment details

No payslip needed according to their Singaporean web site:

You can apply for a Premier Account if you have one of the following:
Hold HSBC Premier status in another country / region.

Do you believe their web site? Because ......

Please update here with regards to your friend's HK application situation

My friend just went into a HSBC branch in Hong Kong, not even an hour ago. The staff member said that they could not see her account in Australia, so they opened a free normal "One" account instead of the "Premier" account.

They could not see her account on the computer. Can you believe that?!

Or an abuse of the intent of the requirement.

Well, how could it be an abuse if that's what they asked for? They have
"Maintain a minimum combined balance of AUD150,000 equivalent in an HSBC Australia"
but then they also have
"Maintain regular 'money in' deposits totalling AUD9,000 into your account each month"

They came up with the second rule, all us customers are following their rule to the book.

 

[desafinado74]

Not me, I don't use HSBC, as HSBC AU is part of HSBC Hong Kong, and HSBC HK has to comply with requests from the Hong Kong government, and they have complied with political crackdowns by freezing and taking people's money, so, no, no HSBC for me, as I don't know if I'm also blacklisted / wanted by Hong Kong government.



No payslip needed according to their Singaporean web site:

You can apply for a Premier Account if you have one of the following:
Hold HSBC Premier status in another country / region.

Do you believe their web site? Because ......



My friend just went into a HSBC branch in Hong Kong, not even an hour ago. The staff member said that they could not see her account in Australia, so they opened a free normal "One" account instead of the "Premier" account.

They could not see her account on the computer. Can you believe that?!



Well, how could it be an abuse if that's what they asked for? They have
"Maintain a minimum combined balance of AUD150,000 equivalent in an HSBC Australia"
but then they also have
"Maintain regular 'money in' deposits totalling AUD9,000 into your account each month"

They came up with the second rule, all us customers are following their rule to the book.

Ah i see, Yeah it is sad with regards to HK's current political situation. The tourism and expat numbers are way down in HK nowadays as well.

Ewww, HSBC HK is so disorganised ! They should have called their Australian counterparts, to double check your friend's Premier status.

I will report back of my experiences when trying to open Premier accounts in both Malaysia and Singapore.

 

[Chicken]

Ewww, HSBC HK is so disorganised ! They should have called their Australian counterparts, to double check your friend's Premier status.

Good thinking, why didn't any of us thought of this?!

Having said that, I can only see two benefits for Australia, and that's Global View and Premier credit card. The credit card at 0.75 SQ mile per $1 is still a good card for $199 annual fee.

On a side note, for Hong Kong, the only 2 benefits to having premier status, are:
- $0 for outward telegraph transfer instead of HKD$70
- free instead of HKD$40 when using Mastercard debit card to access non HSBC ATMs

So Premier maybe good to have, but is it a super dooper must have? Um...

 

[mini2]

I went into the Chatswood branch asking them if they can organise my HK's HSBC One to be upgraded to Premier. They said I'll need to call the Australian RM team. No problem.

I called the RM team then I am informed I will need to call the HK side to do the upgrade, even though they can see the accounts (I've linked them already). The RM team then said they don't know who to contact in HK to get my HSBC One upgraded.

I've asked them if I ask for a replacement debit card, what will it say? It won't have the words Premier on it. OK then.

 

[Chicken]

The RM team then said they don't know who to contact in HK to get my HSBC One upgraded.

Haha, so much for status!

Have you tried doing the upgrade via app or phone?

 

[mini2]

The app/website are both looking for $1mil HKD+ in any of the local accounts, so I'm afraid it won't work.

 

[Chicken]

The RM team then said they don't know who to contact in HK to get my HSBC One upgraded.

Guess HSBC doesn't have intranet, doesn't have SharePoint, huh?!

 

[Ausbt]

I really lost it with HSBC earlier this year. On the app in Profile it keeps warning me my resi address needed updating. Ok fine. The correct address was actually there it was only the 'start living at date' that was missing, but issue is it simply won't save - the app button is inactive. I tried a few times and of course, gave up, what do I care? Well HSBC cared. I was o/s in August and they put a block on my card due to 'continual failure to update profile'. Now a block on one card is inconvenient but a block on a card that possibly has forward accom bookings on it awaiting charges is potentially diabolical, as booking.com tends to just cancel them if they fail. Naturally many msgs with the chat line followed with no one understanding what the problem was.

An entire month went by and I returned to Oz, heading straight into a branch. The branch had no idea. It was all uncovered a full 8 weeks after the block (which continued) at which point I demonstrated to the branch staff that I could not update my profile. I asked for a complaint to be lodged. After 4 months they advised "we wrote a letter to you asking you to update. So sad too bad that you could use your card for two months". I suspect (given I had a mortgage with HSBC 8 years ago) that they wrote to that address, but certainly despite being asked they would not tell me.

 

[k_sheep]

Dammit, I literally JUST transferred my first lot of $9k to start the clock.

Back to the old drawing board.

 

[QF_Flyer]

Ah i see, Yeah it is sad with regards to HK's current political situation. The tourism and expat numbers are way down in HK nowadays as well.

Ewww, HSBC HK is so disorganised ! They should have called their Australian counterparts, to double check your friend's Premier status.

I will report back of my experiences when trying to open Premier accounts in both Malaysia and Singapore.

FWIW, I opened a HSBC HK Premier account, there was a lot of back and forth trying to verify why I needed it and proving my time in HK (I'd entered HK 11 times in 24 months, so that was easy enough to prove), they have since had no issues sending everything to Australia.

I also have HSBC Premier US, UK and Expat (Jersey) (plus HK & AU). Only HK actually asked any questions at all, the rest were basically tick and flick.

 

[oz_mark]

I guess to answer the question posed by the thread title - yes, it was too good to be true

 

[georgie23]

FWIW, I opened a HSBC HK Premier account, there was a lot of back and forth trying to verify why I needed it and proving my time in HK (I'd entered HK 11 times in 24 months, so that was easy enough to prove), they have since had no issues sending everything to Australia.

I also have HSBC Premier US, UK and Expat (Jersey) (plus HK & AU). Only HK actually asked any questions at all, the rest were basically tick and flick.

Just out of curiosity - with the Expat account did you open or use this as a Euro account?

 

[desafinado74]

FWIW, I opened a HSBC HK Premier account, there was a lot of back and forth trying to verify why I needed it and proving my time in HK (I'd entered HK 11 times in 24 months, so that was easy enough to prove), they have since had no issues sending everything to Australia.

I also have HSBC Premier US, UK and Expat (Jersey) (plus HK & AU). Only HK actually asked any questions at all, the rest were basically tick and flick.

Thanks for replying. I got rejected for the Malaysia account opening lol. I told them i wanted the account for property investment, and they said i needed to show intent to buy a property within 6 months, not 1 to 2 years. I will need to try again with a good excuse.

 

[QF_Flyer]

Thanks for replying. I got rejected for the Malaysia account opening lol. I told them i wanted the account for property investment, and they said i needed to show intent to buy a property within 6 months, not 1 to 2 years. I will need to try again with a good excuse.

No worries - sorry to hear re MY, I was having a look through the options and it's very variable re requirements. I was looking at Bermuda (having recently been it renewed my thoughts about potential tax efficiencies long term), but it was a fleeting thought and too hard anyway.
I think I was sort of lucky with HK, in that I am there a lot (I was actually there when they approved it), but it hadn't occurred to me that there'd be hurdles in some countries.

 

[desafinado74]

No worries - sorry to hear re MY, I was having a look through the options and it's very variable re requirements. I was looking at Bermuda (having recently been it renewed my thoughts about potential tax efficiencies long term), but it was a fleeting thought and too hard anyway.
I think I was sort of lucky with HK, in that I am there a lot (I was actually there when they approved it), but it hadn't occurred to me that there'd be hurdles in some countries.

So true, and the HSBC Premier advertisement on the surface is a bit misleading re : being able to open overseas accounts (The ad gives you the impression that it's so easy to open accounts in other countries)

 

[QF_Flyer]

So true, and the HSBC Premier advertisement on the surface is a bit misleading re : being able to open overseas accounts (The ad gives you the impression that it's so easy to open accounts in other countries)

Agree, I had a look through a few and they had a caveat of "have a good reason for needing the account", which could be anything.

It's also somewhat variable in terms of credit cards, on the surface "get you set up with a credit card in your new country", yet you need to be a resident for a lot of them, so how will that work before you actually become one (and if)? It is what it is I suppose!