HSBC Business Payment Limits

dougmountain

Has any other small business user with HSBC had problems with daily limits? We have had this issue with HSBC now for a number of months.

The default daily payment limit with HSBC - telephone and internet - by user and for the whole business is 10K. This is of course not suitable when any business has a monthly payroll that goes over 10K. The limit cannot be increased except through downloading and print and completing and posting a form. Telephone and online banking does not provide this facility - presumable because they dont feel their service is secure enough for this.

Anyway - 1 month after completing and submitting this form to the branch... nothing.

So.. remedy... as this needs to go to the branch... I attempted to call the branch.... however, all branch numbers are 'number unobtainable'... so I wait inline for the call center.

2nd call to call center... they have the form... dont know why it wasnt processed... they need to speak with the branch.... 4 hour minimum turnaround... Mmmm imagine if I stood in the branch and had to wait for 4 hours...

Anyway - 4hours and my international payment deadline (3:30pm) with HSBC will have passed... so not able to make payments again.

Am I frustrated with HSBC... Yes!!!:mad:

Do I want HSBC to let me speak to the branch so that I can discuss something that must be done through the branch YES.

Centralizing facilities through online banking and telephone banking is fine... BUT... they need to factor in ANY demand that they place to go through the branch.

Savvy_Sue

DH gets round this by paying half his staff one day, and half the next.

Aquamania

dougmountain wrote: »

Has any other small business user with HSBC had problems with daily limits? We have had this issue with HSBC now for a number of months.

The default daily payment limit with HSBC - telephone and internet - by user and for the whole business is 10K. This is of course not suitable when any business has a monthly payroll that goes over 10K. The limit cannot be increased except through downloading and print and completing and posting a form. Telephone and online banking does not provide this facility - presumable because they dont feel their service is secure enough for this.

Anyway - 1 month after completing and submitting this form to the branch... nothing.

So.. remedy... as this needs to go to the branch... I attempted to call the branch.... however, all branch numbers are 'number unobtainable'... so I wait inline for the call center.

2nd call to call center... they have the form... dont know why it wasnt processed... they need to speak with the branch.... 4 hour minimum turnaround... Mmmm imagine if I stood in the branch and had to wait for 4 hours...

Anyway - 4hours and my international payment deadline (3:30pm) with HSBC will have passed... so not able to make payments again.

Am I frustrated with HSBC... Yes!!!:mad:

Do I want HSBC to let me speak to the branch so that I can discuss something that must be done through the branch YES.

Centralizing facilities through online banking and telephone banking is fine... BUT... they need to factor in ANY demand that they place to go through the branch.

I thought the usual daily limit for HSBC Business customers was £100k - it's £10k for Personal customers.
This limit applies to internet banking, faster payments, etc.

Most businesses (except very small ones) usually pay their staff salary via BACS that is not subject to these limits.

InsideInsurance

Certainly my HSBC account has a higher limit, dont know what it is but have certainly put nearly 45k through with online transactions in a day (with one of the transactions being 27k) and had no problems.

I know when I first opened it I had a fee applied which when I queried it I was told it was for a non-standard transaction limit that had been setup but I am sure that was for foreign transactions

dougmountain

The daily limit for Telephone and Internet banking with HSBC Business is 10K GBP. This might not be for ALL businesses but it is for ours with an annual turnover of less than 1M GBP. To request BACS above 10K takes further steps / under-writing. The same limit is applied to each user (telephone or internet) and as a cummulative figure per day.

International transfers must be completed by 3:30pm each day. Why 3:30pm UK time... well you see HSBC computers only work until 3:30pm because they get really tired by then and need to rest until the following day... What might happen here is that when you enter a payment request... someone at a screen somewhere in HSBC is watching... and they manually put it through... who knows... You could enter them as future payments... but future payments are not supported with International payments on HSBC...

I am sorry. I design software, and I hate badly implemented systems. HSBC online banking is just awful. Clearly it is only as good as the legacy systems that it sits on.... when I look at my business bank transactions... should I care which 'page' of my statement a transaction is on.. of course not... but HSBC Business Internet banking does... it is a dog. If they spent as much money on the business internet banking as they spend on a single branch, then I think they might get something useful. If they are spending more... then it doesn't show. How I would dearly love to provide constructive feedback...

Since posting this message, the HSBC branch has called. Too late for todays payments (which are international), and they are investigating why the original request fell down a black hole to ensure such a thing doesn't happen to other customers.

happywarmgun

I have the same issue. Most of the time it isn't a problem, but at new year I was trying to pay myself back a director loan of 50k and had to spread it over five days. Not earth shattering, but slightly frustrating. I'm sick of HSBC to be honest. The phone support is rubbish, they've never ever, ever got back to me on a querey I've left. I used to put up with it because it was 'Free' but since they started adding on monthly fees even for those in credit (I've never once in four years gone over-drawn and have maintained a balance of 2-80k constantly!, I do no cash transactions, maybe 4 or 5 cheques a year - everything else is electronic - for the first three years this was at zero cost) now they charge me a monthly 'fee'. Essentially for me lending them money!!!! Time to switch.... if I could find a bank who didn't have much the same T&Cs! (any suggestions?)

InsideInsurance

dougmountain wrote: »

The daily limit for Telephone and Internet banking with HSBC Business is 10K GBP. This might not be for ALL businesses but it is for ours with an annual turnover of less than 1M GBP.

Our business has under a 1m turnover, not even half that, but certainly has more than a 10k limit that was never requested or referred to any individual for authorisation.

Savvy_Sue

I know DH has the same problems, the interface is appalling, and he can't edit his list of beneficiaries except to add to it, so if anyone changes their bank account, he has to add them a second time and then check he's using the right one.

I don't know if he's asked to increase his limit, but he pays his staff by BACS and hits this exact same problem of exceeding the daily limit, so as I said he pays half the staff one day and puts the rest through for the next day. It shouldn't have to be that way, it means some of them get paid a day earlier than the others, but that's what he does to preserve his sanity.

DKLS

Try switching to Cater Allen Private Bank, they are owned by Santander, BUT the customer service is awesome, if you ring you can speak to a human in England who 9 times out of 10 can action what you need.


I really wish they would implement the same training at Santander where my personal accounts are.

Aquamania

DKLS wrote: »

Try switching to Cater Allen Private Bank, they are owned by Santander, BUT the customer service is awesome, if you ring you can speak to a human in England who 9 times out of 10 can action what you need.


I really wish they would implement the same training at Santander where my personal accounts are.

What daily transaction limit on internet banking do they offer?

Do they even offer faster payments? I heard that outgoing payments don't usually get processed until the next working day after request.

Aquamania

dougmountain wrote: »

The daily limit for Telephone and Internet banking with HSBC Business is 10K GBP. This might not be for ALL businesses but....

It isn't.

The maximum limit is £100k, but the bank may set a lower limit.

http://www.business.hsbc.co.uk/1/PA_esf-ca-app-content/content/pdfs/en/DP270_managing_the_service_guide.pdf
(section 7.2, page 15)