HSBC overdraft limit

crazyben

Hi,
Posting my experience here in case it's useful to anyone.

Yesterday I got a "secure message" from HSBC (to be be followed by a letter in the post) saying they had decided to (drastically) reduce  my overdraft limit. I don't use the overdraft often, but I do sometimes need it, I don't want to give it up. 

There was no number on the letter so I spoke to someone in telephone banking, they said to call back in business hours.

So I called telephone banking this morning, was told I needed to speak to Lending, they said there is nothing they can do in normal telephone banking, but they would transfer me to Lending.
I was transferred to someone who said, "ok, I have your details, give me a moment and we'll try to sort this out. Can I put you on hold". I agreed, was on hold for a moment, then unfortunately the line went dead.

I called back and this is where the saga started.
I was told that there was nothing that could be done about my request. My overdraft would definitely be reduced, this could not be changed. There was no one I could speak to about this. No they couldn't transfer my call to Lending.

I was told that the previous person I spoke to was mistaken when they said something could be done. I was told there was no way my call had been or could be transferred to Lending. I was told even if it was, Lending would say nothing could be done. And in any case it is not possible to transfer a call to Lending, and anyone who had told me otherwise was wrong. They even went so far as to say they had raised a complaint to the manager of the previous person I spoke to.
They were so adamant I began to doubt myself. They said they had a record of my previous call and I had only spoken to one person. They said my call had never been transferred to Lending.

I asked many times to be transferred to Lending or the previous helpful person I spoke to, I was told this wasn't possible.
Eventually I gave up and politely, wearily ended the call. As I had been put on hold many times this was well over an hour since the start of my call.

Some time later, I remembered I had an old letter about my overdraft. I found it and it had a number to call on it. I called the number and was told "Hello you've come through to HBSC Lending how can we help" 
I explained the problem, they spent about 1 min checking my account then said "ok that's all done, your overdraft has been retained, please ignore any letter you get to the contrary"

Unbelievable.

The number for Lending is 0345 600 9067 if you have the same issue.