I have been using credit cards for many number of years and when I was offered HSBC gold card as lifetime free I decided to check it out even after hearing many horror stories and alas I made a stupid mistake. I have been using it for only a couple of months now and have already faced many issues.
The initial statement never made it to my home after a couple of transactions and when I enquired about it I was told that it was sent to the wrong address and the person at that address had returned it saying he doesnt hold this card anymore. I would have expected at a minimum that a bank worth to be called one will update its database with the new address when someone is offered a card that was used by someone else before but guys at HSBC dont seem to think that is required. So they happily slap a late fee, interest, service tax etc. for their mistake and dont even bother to send a new statement immediately to my address and give the details only after I call.
The call center guy informed me during this call that since this is the case I cannot use my card anymore and I will be sent a new card and that the request was already put in blah blah and it will be coming in 4 days, its more than 40 days now and still no new car has appeared. And meanwhile my old card is still unusable, that is not really a concern because I dont plan to use it anymore.
I wanted to still pay the fine close to 500rs inspite of it being HSBC’s mistake and close the card to avoid wasting time with their phone bankers because I am sure that even if I ask them to revert the amount these conmen are going to come back later with the same amount as has happened to some others in this forum. Now another pain starts, I submit a cheque a cool 6 business days before the due date and it hasnt been cleared at the end of due date. When I call up they claim it normally takes only(that itself is funny) 3 business days even for same station cheques and say will get back with the status by end of day everytime but they never do. I am pretty sure they are deliberately delaying the clearance to again slap the late fee, otherwise I find no reason not to encash a cheque even 1 week after dropping it. This is a clear case of cheap fraud and I shudder to think what happens to people who take credit or EMIs from them when they can indulge in such activities for a simple ontime cheque payment.
I have used many cards including SCB and ICICI before, I can understand hidden charges etc. are part of the deal but such deliberate fraud is something that is new and disgusting. My advice to those thinking about falling into the HSBC lifetime free gold card trap is to avoid it like the plague.