Posted by: Peter Massey | 1.12.2007
I’ve had a lot of feedback about the HSBC and first direct credit card blog “1 contact vs 23 contacts“
When I tried to use the HSBC card on Tuesday night to buy some tube tickets for the Chief Customer Officers’ trip across town, as I suspected it wasn’t over yet. It didn’t work.
When I came to pay the bill for the excellent dinner at “Dans Le Noir” it bounced. Now if you saw the size of the bill you wouldn’t be surprised. I did wonder whether I’d bust my limit.
Wednesday I thought ‘one more try’ and tried to top up my Oyster card with it and it bounced.
The following day was a busy one and so on ThursdayI checked with our finance lady and it seemed ok. I called the number on my card to be answered very quickly by a lady of impeccable manners. Strangely she called me Peter before I had given her any details. Clearly they were on my case! The only marker she had was for ‘payment requested over the limit’. The helpful lady suggested that I probably hadn’t bust my limit but had probably bust the aggregate limit on my card.
I accepted the point and talked to finance to sort it out.
So far so good but something didn’t smell right. The first payment that was declined was only for £16. It wasn’t enough to break a limit. Whatever, life’s too short, move on.
Then Friday night I got a text from my colleague. “You’ll never believe it, but I’ve had a call from the HSBC fraud people asking for you to ring them”.
As per the last story, obviously they still had my colleague’s names and details attached to my card and were ringing him.
So I rang the number on the card on Saturday. And went through security. Card number, date of birth and any two consecutive letters from my favourite word. At least they stopped asking me for my postcode and then telling me it was wrong. But I havent given them a special word. “It could be your mothers maiden name” the helpful lady suggested. It was. I realised she obviously had the whole of my mothers maiden name on screen and that the lady a few days before had done the same thing with the same helpful suggestion. Is that security?
Nothing wrong with the balance. No flag on the account. Eventually I got transferred offshore to the fraud department. Just before I hung up after waiting 2 minutes 25 seconds on hold.
She asked had I tried to make a payment in Steam. Avoiding all jokes about trains, I didnt recognise it - but we moved on before I answered yes or no (afterward I remembered the beers late in the night in the Steam bar….). Had I tried to make a payment at Hilton. No, but I had stayed there this week. And not paid anything on my credit card. All cash. Had I paid anything on SE Trains earlier - yes.
OK, she would reinstate my card. It was just a fraud check she said, nothing to do with balances. I didn’t argue because I don’t want to go through 23 contacts again to get a new card.
So the questions that I am left with are:
1) Will they ever get me attached to my phone number and details, not my colleague?
2) Why did my card bounce for £16 when that wouldn’t break the limit? Was it in fact a fraud check?
3) Who tried to take money off my card at the Hilton?
4 ) Why was my card reinstated when there could have been a risk? It was my fault - I just wanted my card working and I need to find out what was going on at the Hilton. I think I know so I took the risk.
I got the outcome I wanted, my card working again. This time in only 7 contacts (me to finance, me to bank, me to finance, finance to me, bank to colleague, colleague to me, me to bank).
But shouldn’t the first 2 contacts have sorted it and left no questions open:
- Bounce at the tube, be it fraud check or balance problem
- Text or call to me (not my colleague)
- I call the bank and we agree it’s real or they tell me I have a balance problem so I dont try and use the card to embarass myself in front of 15 of the top customer experience people in the country
If you’re reading this - do get in touch with your observations at peter.massey@budd.uk.com
HSBC, customer experience design, process improvement | No Comments
Posted by: Peter Massey | 17.11.2007
Why is it always me that gets cloned? Well at least a useful comparison was possible this time….
My HSBC business credit card was cloned several weeks ago. By my reckoning the first call took place on the 2nd October. It’s now the 17th November and the replacement is still not set up properly. There have been more than 20 contacts so far.
My first direct personal credit card was cloned last Saturday the 10th November and the replacement was with me and working by Wednesday 14th. It would have been Tuesday but I was away.
First the right way to do it. I’m shopping with my daughter in London and the first 2 transactions bounce so I call first direct. They transfer me to the fraud unit and a lady abroad ( sorry forgot to ask whether it was Malaysia or India - betya it’s an HSBC centre though) asks me if I’ve tried downloading songs from iTunes that morning which I haven’t. So bang goes the Xmas shopping on the credit card. I wasn’t happy. 
She tells me the card will be with me within 5 to 7 working days and I’m thinking “oh yeah?” given what I’m going through with the business account. Anyway I get home Wednesday to find it there and I’ve had no problem using it subsequently. Bingo - one very satisfied customer.
Could it have been better. Well yes. They could have called me before I had the embarassment of a snooty waitress at Harvey Nicks bouncing my card. They could have had the first person I called ask me about the iTunes transactions, rather than a rather lengthy transfer tying up me and the agent. The second agent could have spoken more clearly and been more understanding at my protests of being without a card for a week. They could have said that the card would go out same day and be there Tuesday and I’d have thought they were really trying to make it quick.
What about HSBC then? I’ll try and remember as many of the contacts as I can…..
1) The first call came at about 9pm from an Indian sounding lady saying she was from HSBC and could she have my credit card number, date of birth etc. Strangely enough I said “no - she couldn’t until she could prove she was HSBC and not some “phisher”". We got nowhere as the process says she can’t talk to me til I’ve been through security and since security was evidently silly I wasn’t willing to and they should get somebody sensible to ring me (lucky I had that glass of wine or I’d have been uptight by now !)
2) & 3) I then had a call from my colleague who’d had an earlier call from HSBC about the card. He’d told them they’d have to ring me. He explained they’d told him the card had been cloned.
4) Another Indian gentleman called me and attempts to take me through security again. I again refuse and ask him to go through my security checks. Tell me which company name is the card in? He can’t tell me anaything until I’ve been through security. Tell me the HSBC phone numbers on my credit card - he gave me 2 and both failed my identity check. So we parted company there.
By complete coincidence I had a conference call the following day with the nice guy at HSBC who runs the offshore centres and gave him the feedback on the security process.
Then I did nothing for a couple of weeks. The bank did nothing. Exactly as a phisher would do. My card stopped working though so heh maybe they were real. I just starting using another card from another bank.
Two weeks later on the 17th October I was speaking at the Institute of Customer Services Conference. I use several real examples of “dumb things” and this was at once added to the repertoire.
5) At the end of my talk, no less than the Customer Service Director of first direct comes up and wants my details to sort it out. He may not be HSBC directly but he takes it on personally - that’s fabulous. At the end of the conference I pick up my voice mails.
6) The first direct guy has called the right person in HSBC
7) He or she has obviously called Claire….
& 9) …..who has called me and left 2 voicemails whilst I have been in the conference
10) I return the call but she’s not there so I leave a message and…
11) ….she returns the call and we speak. She’s taken up the case and will sort it out. No security checks required, I notice.
12) & 13) When I get back to email, I find that Claire had emailed me to. I mail back and say thanks
I wait for the card over a week but nothing comes. In fairness there’s a postal strike.
14) Eventually I call Claire again and she checks it has been sent and it must be in the post.
15) I wait some more and eventually it arrives. At my colleague’s house. I get it next time we meet in a few days time. Then I wait some more for the pin number to arrive.
16) & 17) I email Claire again. She emails back. The card was preset up with the same pin so no need to have waited at all ! How dumb do I feel? But heh it didnt say that on the letter with the card….
I use the card and it works… YES ! But wait…. I try to use it on the web to pay for wireless access. This requires my address. The card bounces again. I try again. No. It bounces.
18) & 19) I ask my PA to call the number on the card and get the address corrected which she does. Of course they cant take her instruction as she cant pass security. So she passes the phone to me, but the computer says no. No I cant have my own address on my own card as I had before. Her insistence that it has never been possible drives me to distraction and I pass her back to my PA to escalate to the supervisor. After 20 minutes on hold she hangs up.
20) & 21) So she emails Claire at my request. Claire emails back to say she can’t take my PA’s instruction as she’s not a named contact on the account.
22) I email her back and confirm the instruction to have me on my address. And not to swap my colleagues onto my address!!!! No security but it apparently happens.
23) Last week my existing pin number arrived in the post under one of those sticky flaps in the letter! Not something I was happy with from a security point of view, since as with many people I’m sure, its the same one I use on my other cards.
I haven’t yet tried to use the card with my address details so I don’t know whether it’s really fixed. But I won’t be surprised if it doesn’t. And I wont be dsurprised if a colleagues card stops working.
Have I complained? No, I’ve done enough work. Will I move banks. No - its tons of work and wont be any better. I’ve used many banks and see no differences.
And do I feel like putting our insurance business thro HSBC? You guessed it - about 23 times less likely than going to first direct. Oh when will they start business banking !! Then it would be worth moving.
So an extreme story? - I dont think so judging by our personal experiences of dealing with banks. And we have further evidence from our work with the Amazon Skyline processes. One of our banking clients has reduced their contact rate by 81% in the past three years. Another US client has quadrupled the size of their business and decresed their contact support headcount by 20% at the same time.
If you work at HSBC and want to talk about how we can save you up to 80% of your operating budget then contact me on 07802 793515 or peter.massey@budd.uk.com
If you work at first direct and are reading this - fabulous, thank you and yes - when are you going to start business banking ! ??
If you are just a blog reader - Hi, thanks for reading and you can get more in our white paper “100 things you can learn from first direct”in our library
100 things, HSBC, contact rate, first direct | No Comments
