Upon arriving in India, my Director of Finance told me that we, as a company, bank with HSBC and he could help me set up an HSBC account through the Indian branch here in Delhi. This would give me all the benefits of HSBC’s global network and when I returned to the states, the account would follow me home – a kind of end around of the incompetency of the US branch. Sounded reasonable.
He called the bank and they sent a Vice President to my office to fill out the application and collect the documents. They, then, followed me home to get the signatures of my wife and copies of her documents. This is service, I thought … naively having only been in India a few months!
Now that I have been in India for over a year, I now understand that Indians would crawl through a mile of human waste to get your business, but would not walk across the office to keep it. This was no exception. From the moment the account was open, the illusion of customer service disappeared and was replaced by a level of incompetence typically only seen with politicians. As much as I would love to lay the blame at the feet of typical Indian incompetence and laziness, I think this is one of those mystical occurrences when a poorly run organization mixes with a culture that embraces all its shortcomings. The result is an experience that so absurd, it defies logic.
It began with the cash transfer into the account. The gentlemen that were so helpful in coming to the office and the house to open the account may have left out one critical detail concerning how their bank handles transfers - they take a significant chunk for themselves. I was furious. I was not angry at the fee, as I am reasonable enough to understand that the bank needs to make money, but I was pissed that they did not disclosed the fee. I made my usual calls to the bank explaining to the VP that it was not a question of “if” the fees would be refunded, but “when.” “The real question”,” I explained, “was if he would be around to see it!”
Anyone who knows me, knows I have a sense of “justice” that runs deep –especially when I think I am in the right (which is almost always). I believe this justice needs to be pursued with every ounce of strength I can summon – the more casualties the better! I am not saying this is right, I am just stating a fact.
I began an email campaign at HSBC India that started with the local branch and finally fell on the ear of the Regional Vice President of the Bank. I outlined how trust is essential in a banking relationship and once a bank gets a reputation of unethical behavior, especially in an expat community as tight as the one in Delhi, customers began to flee from the bank like Obama from accountability (too soon?). It could really damage the careers of all associated with said financial institution. 3 hours after the email was received, I had confirmation that the charges were reversed and the offending banking officer had been terminated. You can’t say I didn’t warn him.
Over the next 12 months, things continued to get worse. 80% of my checks were declined for signature match. Seriously, signature match? What year is this? In India, every check is manually compared to the signature on file and any deviation, no matter how slight, causes a rejection. Can anyone remember the last check you had rejected for signature match? In addition, my ATM card stopped working . . . in December; checks I ordered were never delivered; and bank never returned my calls. A few weeks ago, I reached my limit and went down to the branch to address these issues in person.
The type of account I have has an individual assigned to it called a Relationship Manager. My Relationship Manager was a 20 something Indian woman that knew less about banking and the working of HSBC than I did. After sitting in the lobby for 10 minutes while she chatted happily on her mobile, I was finally asked to come in to her office. We went through the list of issues and her proposed solutions.
- Signature Match: Her solution was to complete another signature card and, in her mind, that would cure the issue. I tried to explain that all signatures have slight deviations from signing to signing and if I filled out another card, my next signing would deviate from that. There is no exact repeatability in signatures; there is only reasonable match. This stumped her, so I let it go hoping to use my political clout on another, more solvable issue.
- ATM Card: In her system, my ATM card was fine even though when we walked down to the ATM machine it was rejected. This confused her, but did not inspire her to solve the issue. I asked for the card to be reset and a new PIN sent to my home. Reluctantly, she agreed.
It was at this point, that she realized that my address had been blocked. This, obviously, accounted for why the first group of checks had not been sent and why all correspondence from the bank had never reached my house. Apparently, they had tried to send something in February and it was returned, so they blocked the address for security purposes. In all fairness, my mail is a little unreliable due to my refusal to pay a bribe to the postman last November during the Diwali season (it is like Christmas).
I asked her to change the address to my work address, but this was a major issue. She needed me to provide a utility bill from my work address with my name on it. Now, I am not sure where you work, but where I work, the company typically does not put its water and electricity into the employee’s names. I explained this to her using a pithy combination of fact and sarcasm – it was not appreciated. In the end, she agreed to unblock the address, reorder the checks and send both the checks and the PIN to the home address. I skeptically agreed and left the bank with no hope of ever seeing the posted items again.
I few weeks later, I get a call from a woman from HSBC informing me that my cook was attempting to cash a check and inquiring if I wrote said check. I said that I had. She then explained that the account had been frozen, yes frozen, due to me not updating the account with my new visa information. “My what?” I retorted. She explained that all foreign accounts needed a current visa on file or the account would be frozen. I explained to her, in my best Denis Leary voice, that I had no idea and this is the type of information of which one might want to inform their account holders – you know, since the result is a frozen account! This time, my pithy combination replaced fact with a flurry of explicatives – the sarcasm remained the constant (needless to say). This was rapidly followed by my explaining to her that she needed to figure out a way to pay my cook or “I will get in my car and come down there and bring a shit storm upon you of such magnitude that people in the bank will talk about long after you have been fired!” I remember this quote because upon uttering it, I looked up to see my secretary in my doorway with her jaw completely dropped. She often reminds me of this.
The cook was paid!
At this point, I had had enough. My secretary and I set about to find out who the top dog was at HSBC in India. Once we found her name, we then set about deciphering the HSBC email suffix system. Once we cracked this, I wrote an email to the President of HSBC India outlining all the above issues sans the sarcasm and cursing.
Within 2 hours, my account was reopened, my address changed, a third checkbook ordered and, along with my new PIN number, sent to my work address. When the call came, you could tell that there was general sense of “give this man anything he wants.” I should have asked for a higher interest rate on my accounts!
In the end, the bank is now on its very best behavior with me. The original Relationship Manager is seeking other career opportunities; I have written two checks that have not been rejected; and my ATM card is working like a champ. I received a follow up call a few days later asking if all my issues had been resolved. I told the person that they had for now, but that I will not soon lose the email address of the President.
In India, it is good to know the boss!
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