HSBC - Telephone Banking - No Security!

Paul_Varjak

If you have an account with HSBC and access to their telephone banking be aware that it is not secure!

Often you are told to visit your branch to give them the account number and password. That means one HSBC employee knows both your account number and password! Insist on entering the password yourself onto their computer at the branch!

If you change you password you can do so via HSBC telephone banking but, again, you have to do this by giving the account number and password to the HSBC employee on the end of a telephone line!

Banking institutions always say that you should not disclose your password to anyone - not even the Police. So, why is HSBC different?

I am now moving the accounts away from HSBC in haste!

Fatboy_NSS

I honestly can't see why this is a threat. You do, after all, have to give your full password to at least one member of staff so the password can be set up. Also don't forget that anything done on the bank's system is logged, so it would be relatively easy to find out which staff member had dealt with customers who go on to report fraud.

Anyway, banks indemnify their customers against fraudulent losses that aren't their fault. I think you can be pretty damn certain that, if a bank employee was found to be nicking money from customer accounts, the bank would pay up with pretty hefty compensation to try and aviod the negative PR.

I do understand your concerns, but I don't think it's enough of a worry to switch banks over (and who would you change to?)