For old fashioned service at a top notch modern bank. (HSBC)

Member Name: LoolooMe

Product:	HSBC
Date:	07/07/09 (36 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: The service, the localities.

Disadvantages: The take out fee abroad.

What is it:
A world bank which can provide you the broad range of personal products (including current accounts, savings, loans, and credit cards) and can also provide you with a broad range of business products.

For more information on their products see: http:// www.hsbc.co.uk/1/2/personal;jsessionid=0000rzAa5va B97iO-m0iyORdw5g:11j71fovq

I only have a current account with them, so it is on this that my account is based.

Branches: Living in a city I find that they have a lot of branches including the unmanned braches.

Unmanned Branches. Although people complain about these unmanned branches I don't mind as:
1. It saves you money (yes the bank saves money and so they can invest it back into products and it will eventually lead back to you)
2. They are staffed at reasonable times and the staff can help with with lots of queries including extending overdrafts and updating the type of account you have.
3. You can do quite a lot in the unmanned braches such as the mini statment and bills machine, paying in and you can use their telephones to call the HSBC telephone banking.

On the downside they are staffed at bank times (ie close at 4 on week days), so if you work full time you will have to go on a saturday morning. And you can not do anything which involves a teller including changing coins to notes and getting forign exchange.

If you do not like the unmanned braches I have found to mine there are two locally manned branches both less than 30 minutes walk from my unmanned branch so it is not the end of the world.

Manned Branches.
Location: As mentioned above from my house I have easy acess to two branches, and I have never found a city without a branch.

Service: There service is top class. First I shall describe the super branch (in the city center) and then the mini branch (manned two tellers).

Super Branch. They have representatives as soon as you walk in which ask you what you need. If it is paying in or getting a statment then they direct you to the machines and help you use them if you need it. Doing it through the machines even at busy times only takes around 10-15 minutes.
If you have another query which needs a person (for mine it was setting up a direct debit and then getting a reciept for my landlord). Then they take your name and what you need, they ask you to take a seat and tell you how long you may have to wait.

(My story of their service)
Then when it is your turn your adviser which you have been assigned calls you by name (a huge plus points to them for this), and then leads you to their desk. At my local branch the desks were the typical office cubicals, however it was quiet and you did not feel like you could be over heard.
My adviser then chatted with me found out what I needed, set up my derect debit.
He also checked with me that another direct debit that I had set up was all correct.
Then when I asked for a receipt of the direct debit, he went went to find a stamp and a working ink pad and stamped HSBC letter headed paper with a breif note explaining that

Miss.............. had set up a direct debit to pay xx to account number xxxxxxxxxxxx on the xth of everymonth.

Then asked if there was anything else I needed and then wished me luck on my upcoming adventure that we had talked about.

(My 2nd story of service at Super Branch)
I asked the representative to talk to someone about a product. She informed me that they no longer offered it, however she thought that another branch did and recommened that I see them. She also had a breif chat to me about HSBC alternatives.


Service at mini branch (manned).
They are standard bank. Cheerful, don't rush you, polite and always have a smile. Have never had to wait longer than usual and always call out help if the wait is getting long.


World Wide banking.
This is another plus for HSBC, they have branches everywhere which meant on holiday my card was stopped (as in a security hot spot), so I went into a local HSBC branch and explained to them. They then asked me security questions and told me that I could now use it at the ATMs.

One bad thing though is that they still charge you for withdrawing money overseas (I got charged two pounds per withdrawal).

Also there saving rates have not yet been able to tempt me to save with them.

Summary: A very good bank for my current account.