HSBC Premier account

Imelda

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone could tell me whether it would be worth getting this account.

I am with HSBC at the moment, I have a current a/c which my pay goes into and all bills go out of, my mortgage, their internet and regular savers. I also have another current account at another bank where my spending cash goes.

I *think* I might qualify for a free account as my total annual salary this year will be over £75K (basic + bonus which I have already received) and I have a mortgage with them for over £100K. Would they take my bonus into account?

However, I will be selling my flat soon and closing my mortgage, but then the cash I make from the sale should take me above their requirement for £50k savings.

So does anyone know a) whether I would actually get the account and b) is it worth it? (I'm not going to pay them £20 a month for it!)

Thank you!

cocopops_4

Hi Imelda,

The Premier criteria has just changed on May 4th.

The Entry Criteria is now

£50k+ savings or investments with HSBC

or

Sole salary of £75k AND a Mortgage of £250k Minumum.

If you sell your flat and have the £50k, you will qualify (as long as you keep the funds with the bank) and there is no monthly fee for this service if you qualify, and you do get good benefits (im not biased, honest!)

Hope this helps

tom188

Though think of the opportunity cost relative to putting your money in better accounts or investments elsewhere.

Why do you want one anyway?

gt94sss2

cocopops wrote: »

The Premier criteria has just changed on May 4th.

The Entry Criteria is now

£50k+ savings or investments with HSBC

or

Sole salary of £75k AND a Mortgage of £250k Minumum.

If you sell your flat and have the £50k, you will qualify (as long as you keep the funds with the bank) and there is no monthly fee for this service if you qualify, and you do get good benefits (im not biased, honest!)

I know you work for HSBC Premier so I hope you don't mind answering some more questions but I had also been thinking of joining HSBC Premier as well at some stage and did ask for a brochure via the website (several times!) but nothing ever turned up..

I do see you now have a redesigned Premier website now but now it seems telephone is the only way to contact you now (sadly no options seem to be there for sending a brochure or having a webchat as before? )

As such, can you say:

1) If customers met the old Entry Criteria and were already HSBC Premier customers, will they continue to Premier customers, if they don't meet the new criteria (i.e. if in the past they qualified if they had a £200,000 mortgage [no income requirement]) - that option seems to have disappeared?

2) What you think of the benefits available compared to having a standard or HSBC Bank Account Plus. For instance, the 'Premier Points' on the credit card seem very poor value - something like the equivalent of 0.3% cashback if asking for High Street vouchers - unless I have something wrong? Also, the interest rate on the Plus account is higher than that paid on the Premier account?

3) What exactly are the benefits available? The new website seems harder to navigate in some ways than the old one and there doesn't seem to be a comprehensive list of benefits available.. Also can one still request a paper brochure about HSBC Premier (if so, how?)

4) I presume HSBC InvestDirect balances still count towards HSBC Premier?

Sorry, for all these (baisic) questions, I just thought that Premer customers were supposed to get the 'best' deal/products from HSBC but that doesn't always seem to be the case?

Regards
Sunil

pandapaws

We currently have a HSBC Premier Account.

For anyone looking for info on it, the main benefits that we have found are:

Proper telephone banking 24 hours to UK call centres
They don't ever seem to charge us for going over overdraft limit (only happened a handful of times, don't know if they'd tighten the noose if you did it regularly)
Nice black bank card!

We don't use it, but you can also be assigned a 'relationship manager' who deals with all your banking/borrowing at your local branch. I'd recommend doing this, as we were assigned by default to a really evil woman in their Welsh call centre, so don't take the risk!

There are a whole load of benefits if you're an international-business-type, but for average Joe like me, the UK call centre is the biggest bonus.

We recently changed our banking to the Halifax for the incentive £100, and it was the worst thing we ever did - their customer service is appalling. We still have the HSBC Premier account, and are about to change all of our banking back (grass not greener after all!), however we've been told that we won't meet the new criteria, and so won't be able to keep the account once they start to downgrade people.

We're going to hand onto it for as long as possible, just because I don't want to have any dealings with their Indian call centre, but have decided that even the standard HSBC account is better than the Halifax (most things are, dental work, herpes, mosquitoes...anything but trying to talk to someone at the Halifax!!!)

This is just obviously my personal opinion, but hope it may help a bit.

gt94sss2

pandapaws wrote: »

We're going to hand onto it for as long as possible, just because I don't want to have any dealings with their Indian call centre, but have decided that even the standard HSBC account is better than the Halifax (most things are, dental work, herpes, mosquitoes...anything but trying to talk to someone at the Halifax!!!)

Well, one of my parents has just applied for HSBC Premier so I will see what its like, before deciding if its for me..

If HSBC do downgrade you - you might find First Direct a good alternative -its owned by HSBC, so you can use HSBC branches and has 24 hour UK call centres - which seems to be the biggest benefit of HSBC Premier for you.

Also, as you would be switching within the HSBC group, they can transfer over all your standing orders etc, very easily.

Regards
Sunil

ManAtHome

Switching to any alternative account wouldn't be a major problem these days. I have a Premier account, but as soon as it becomes un-economic I'll move it over to Nationwide (already have Flexaccount, savings and credit card for use abroad).

pandapaws

gt94sss2 wrote: »

Well, one of my parents has just applied for HSBC Premier so I will see what its like, before deciding if its for me..

If HSBC do downgrade you - you might find First Direct a good alternative -its owned by HSBC, so you can use HSBC branches and has 24 hour UK call centres - which seems to be the biggest benefit of HSBC Premier for you.

Also, as you would be switching within the HSBC group, they can transfer over all your standing orders etc, very easily.

Regards
Sunil

Thanks, but I have finally managed to pay off the First Direct overdraft that's been lingering for ages, and took great pleasure in telling them where to stuff their account!!! Wasn't particularly impressed with them unfortunately even though I worked for them as a temp about 10 years ago!

We're actually switching back TO HSBC from Halifax, so all the standing orders will have to be done manually sadly. Read somewhere that we'll be downgraded in November, so will hang on until then, and then try and make amends with the people in the foreign call centres who drove us to despair a few years ago when they randomly cancelled a load of our DDs!

skyjumper

i know this quite an old post, but was wondering if anyone has any tips.

Once you have the Premier Account with HSBC, what happens if you no longer meet the critieria any more. I know they will downgrade you to their Normal Bank Account, but what happens to

1.the Premier Debit Card (yes the Black nice one)- will they take that back
2.Premier Credit Card- will that be revoked?
3. Can they start charging you for not meeting the criteria- like £25/month

any comments much appreciated

sach1636

biggest benefit of premier for me till now was free extended warranty on appliances purchased on my credit card. Dell laptop (I know I know...i wont buy dell ever now..) was repaired 3 times without any charges which other wise would have cost good money.

jamshid_2

if anyone out there is already an HSBC premier account holder there i a deal to introduce a friend where the introducer will be credited 100 pounds for introducing a friend and the introducee will get 50 pounds. I was already planning on becoming an hsbc premier account holder so an extra 50 pounds would be nice and there is 100 pounds in it for you! please contact me on [EMAIL="jamshid@rock.com"]jamshid@rock.com[/EMAIL]
thanks