HSBC ransom

immenslyfrustrated

HSBC has chosen to close my business account because I did not respond to their safeguarding request. They sent it to my old email address, did not receive by post and was in amongst all the other scam callers on the phone that I regularly receive

So fine, close the account, no problem

What they then do is say they do not know how long this process will take.

Once it is closed they say they will send me a cheque, but they can't say when

All this time they are holding nearly £50,000 of MY money that I cannot get access to and they refuse to make any payments out of

I cannot pay staff, suppliers and HMRC etc which is causing me an enormous amount of mental stress and depression

HSBC simply hide behind a corporate "helpline" and refuse to give any pertinent answers

Do not trust this organisation with your money !

Enzo_L

I don't think that the lesson to be drawn from your experience is "Do not trust this organisation with your money!" as you say.

I think the lesson to be drawn is that HSBC business customers shouldn't ignore a "safeguarding request".

MeteredOut

There are also secondary lessons about keeping your email address up to date with companies that hold £50K of your money, and to not assume all calls are scammers.

(but the "we don't know when" response is shocking)

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6659118/hsbc-ransom

Presumably this is your businesses money not yours?

Have you not logged into your online banking at all? I know when HSBC did a big KYC drive a few years ago both app and online banking were covered with notifications about the fact they were waiting for stuff from us and you had to go past those messages to get to pay staff, suppliers and HMRC as clearly some of those at least you arent paying by debit card.

Section62

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6659118/hsbc-ransom

They sent it to my old email address

Had you informed them of your new email address and not to use the old one anymore?

MattMattMattUK

This will be a KYC issue, not "safeguarding". Those warnings about needing to complete KYC also pop up in the online banking portal one logs in and to get to the point that they have close your account then you must have been ignoring them for quite some time.

The quickest way to resolve this would be to speak to HSBC and supply the KYC data as requested, they should then be able to reopen the bank account.

MEM62

There are also secondary lessons about keeping your email address up to date with companies that hold £50K of your money, and to not assume all calls are scammers.

Absolutely this.

immenslyfrustrated

Thank you for all the helpful comments

Ignoring all the reasons for the account being closed, I don't have a problem with that, however

Do you believe it is acceptable for HSBC to retain my funds, without giving a date or timescale that they will be returned to me ? Effectively blocking access to my funds

If you believe this is acceptable then you take a different point of view to myself

MeteredOut

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81918953#Comment_81918953

Since you were (in their eyes) unable/unwilling to prove your identity to them, they are now being extra careful before releasing any funds to you. With banks increasingly being held accountable when fraud or scam happens, it is understandable that they want to ensure they're only allowing access to funds to the right people.

But, they should be able to give you a timeframe. Perhaps raise a complaint on their inability to do that.

Ergates

Where does the "ransom" come in? Am I missing something?

penners324

This sounds distinctly like very bad business practices by the OP.