I am having two HSBC credit cards and using them for last 3+ years. I have more good experiences than bad. Below I will list down the pros and cons of having the HSBC cards:
-----PROS -----
Good Reward Programme: HSBC have a very good reward programme. They also have good reward catalogue to choose your gifts from. During festivals like Diwali and Dusshera HSBC provides a number of offers like cash back and double reward points. Till date I have got more than 4000 rs cash back from both my cards and a number of gift coupons by redeeming my reward points.
Good Customer Service: Till date I have received very good service from the customer care. They are always ready to help and also they provide relevant information about your queries.
Easy online access: HSBC provides a very good online access to their cards(all leading companies do pretty much the same). It is a one stop online access for all your need for HSBC cards. You can see your balance, your reward points, payment date, bill date and much more.
Perfect billing: I never ever had any billing issue with HSBC till date. Their billing process seems to be solid and accurate.
-----CONS -----
No Payment using Site: Bad as it sounds. You cannot pay the bill using their online site. Even if you have online access to your card account, you cannot pay through that as the facility is not there till date. But yeah, you can register your card account in your savings bank account and transfer through NEFT. But it is much easier if you have payment facility like SBI card have.
Delay in clearing cheque: I have faced this on two occasions. I paid my bills through cheque long before my due date but HSBC failed to clear them from my bank and those cheques were cleared only after the last date of bill payment. So, you can guess, they put good fine on both the occasion. Well, I had to talk to their customer service guys and they reverted the fines back on both the occasions. But then, I never want to go through this unnecessary hassles.
Annual Fees: Even though I have a life time free credit card, HSBC puts Rs700+ every year as service fee. They do revert the charges back but I have to call them up or write a mail to revert back the charges.
Ok, now I will put my recent problem with this card. I redeemed my reward points and as per the bank bluedirt delivered the items which they never did. After I raised a complaint with the HSBC card dept and two months of deliberation, I got the same response from the HSBC stating BlueDirt said the HSBC card that the items are delivered where as BlueDirt came to me and could not produce any proof of delivery and showed some fake signatures.
Now, I do not mind much about the lost gifts as they were from redeemed points and I do not loose any money. But then, I have asked HSBC to cancel my card as I do not want to take service from some company which cannot protect their customers from frauds committed by their own service providers. I do have good relation with HSBC for last 3+ years but one issue and that hurts. So for now I am asking them to cancel my card and say bye bye.
Overall, I have a good experience with HSBC and will suggest people to use the card carefully till they do not get into some kind of issue. If these things hurt a lot then better to stay away from them :)