HSBC bank was founded in 1865 and served billions of people around the world. HSBC Direct is the online bank division of the HSBC umbrella and have been aggressively gaining market share since 2005. This is a review of the online bank to find out why people love HSBC so much.
HSBC Direct Online Accounts Have One of the Highest Yields
Every bank is changing their interest rates almost as much as their stock prices fluctuates these days but HSBC Direct is always among the highest in yields. What I always keep my account open for is the fact that HSBC Direct is known to offer super high promotional yields for a short amount of time to boost their market share. Sometimes, the yield could be as much as 1% higher than its peers during those promotional periods which I’ve never seen any other bank done.
HSBC Direct Allows You to Link Unlimited External Accounts
Not that I really need it, but I hear that this is important for many people. HSBC Direct Savings Account lets you link to however many external bank accounts as you want. As a comparison, some other banks lets you link up to three.
After you link the accounts, you can transfer money to any of them, whenever you want (the transfer time usually takes 3-5 business days though).
No Account Minimums or Fees with HSBC Direct
The savings account requires no minimum balance and there’s no inactivity or account maintenance fees.
Free Bill Pay with HSBC Online Savings Account
Online savings accounts are giving us more and more reasons to not have a checking account at all. HSBC supports free billpay with its online bank accounts. As you know, I really love this feature and I would highly recommend everyone to open an account and start using this if you haven’t (for more reasons why billpay is so good, check out my FNBO Review).
HSBC Direct’s $0 Liability Online Guarantee
Whether it’s bill pay, stolen passwords or any type of unauthorized use of your account, HSBC covers your liability 100%. This means that whatever happens, you won’t lose even 1 penny. Now that’s what I call “You are covered”.
HSBC Online Bank’s EasyView Service
The EasyView feature is what differentiates HSBC Direct from its competition. EasyView gives you an overview of all your accounts (HSBC and non-HSBC ones) all on one screen. More specifically, EasyView gives you a centralize location to manage your finances and allow you to:
- See all bank account balances as well as details
- Keep track of membership rewards
- Check email
- Read news
- Send account alerts to your email, pager or phone
If anything, you can have a HSBC account with no funds and just use the EasyView since you can save so much time by having one screen to see all your balances. You can even log into all your bank accounts without re-entering your passwords.
Verdict of HSBC Direct
With EasyView and the power of free bill pay, HSBC Direct definitely gets my vote as one of the online bank accounts to bank with. Personally, I have a few online accounts because none of them charge account maintenance fees. This allows me to transfer money in and out of them as rates change and also as I see fit. More specifically with HSBC though, I have an account because I want to take advantage of those promotional rate offers which this bank has proved to launch every once in a while.
Am I saying that everyone should rush to get an account? No, but if you are looking for a bank with an extremely good reputation as well as great features, HSBC is not a great choice.
- HSBC Direct Online Banking – Official Site
{ 1 trackback }
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I absolutely love this account. I’ve had mine for about 4 years or so, and have nothing to even remotely complain about. The ATM card has even come in handy during one of the famous South Florida Hurricanes and I wanted to have more cash then what I had in my regular checking account.
To be fair and objective, the process to open the account isn’t the speediest, but it is very secure and worth the amount of time that it takes. I would much rather have the documents mailed seperately yet securely rather than get everything all at once and risk having if stolen if that is what the main concern is.
Overall, this, along with my E*Trade savings are the only two that I still use.
I have had an HSBC Online Savings Account for about 3 1/2 years and I absolutely love it. I have since opened 2 more accounts with them for additional savings goals. I love that I can manage all accounts in 1 place and how easy it is to do business with them. Despite the fact that their interest rates have dropped dramatically since I first signed up with them, they continue to have the highest interest rate on a savings account around. I highly recommend HSBC!
HSBC Direct’s $0 Liability Online Guarantee
Whether it’s bill pay, stolen passwords or any type of unauthorized use of your account, HSBC covers your liability 100%. This means that whatever happens, you won’t lose even 1 penny. Now that’s what I call “You are covered”.
This is a load of rubbish, I have recently had to contact HSBC regarding fraudulent activity on my account and they told me there was nothing they can do. After speaking to a supervisor I was informed that it was correct and there is nothing they can do about it so I have had to complain, fat lot of good that will do me!
It is a information which i have to have, only just hunting on google and yahoo and straight away obtained this article