HSBC

HSBC Launches Money Transfer and Currency Conversion App Zing

HSBC Launches Money Transfer and Currency Conversion App Zing
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Daily news, HSBC
  • HSBC announced the launch of a new money transfer and currency conversion app and debit card, Zing, this week.
  • Available in both iOS and Android, the app enables users to hold up to 10 different currencies and make transactions in local currency, avoiding point of sale currency conversion fees.
  • Zing was founded by HSBC head of FX and Payments James Allan.

Get ready Revolut and watch out Wise. There’s a new money transfer app coming to market courtesy of HSBC.

The new solution is an app and debit card combo called Zing. The money transfer and currency conversion solution will go live in the U.K. initially. But HSBC has international intentions for the technology. Nuno Matos, CEO of HSBC’s global wealth and personal banking business, noted in an interview with Bloomberg that Zing was part of HSBC’s ambition to be a platform for international payments. As such, Matos said that HSBC has a “global ambition” for Zing and expects to see the technology deployed in Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

Available in both iOS and Android, Zing will be available this week in at the Apple Appstore and via Alphabet’s Google Play platform. Zing will enable users to hold up to 10 different currencies on the app, giving them the ability to lock in conversion rates and spend in local currency without having to deal with the cost of point-of-sale conversion fees. Users will also be able to send money internationally across more than 30 currencies.

HSBC has offered a currency transfer service, Global Money, since 2020. The company says that Global Money has served “hundreds of thousands” of customers to date and processed approximately $11 billion in transactions in 2022. That said, because HSBC customers and non-HSBC customers alike can use the app, the company hopes that Zing will help encourage non-HSBC customers to do more banking with HSBC.

Zing was founded by James Allan, head of FX and Payments at HSBC. In a statement, he referenced a company study that underscored the frustration many people have with money transfer and currency conversion services. “That’s why now is the time for a new kind of international payments solution,” Allan said, “one that combines cutting-edge innovation with the support of an experienced global bank.”

Photo by NastyaSensei

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HSBC Launches Multi-Currency Digital Wallet

HSBC Launches Multi-Currency Digital Wallet
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, HSBC

Multi-currency accounts are expanding beyond the realm of fintechs.

This week, HSBC U.S. is launching a multi-currency digital wallet. The new offering, HSBC Global Wallet, will enable U.S. business banking users to exchange foreign currencies and make transactions across borders without using third party tools.

The wallet, which is also being rolled out in the U.K. and Singapore today, will be available in other markets starting next year.

HSBC Global Wallet will offer small-and-medium-sized businesses instant capability to pay in foreign currencies, including Euros, U.K. Pound Sterling, Hong Kong Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Singapore Dollars, Australian Dollars, and Malaysian Ringgit. As a result, these business users will have the ability to make international payments to the U.K., Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, Malaysia and 19 markets in the Eurozone using domestic real-time payment networks. The ability for businesses to receive these local currencies will be available later this year.

“We are excited that the U.S. is one of the first markets in which we are launching HSBC Global Wallet,” said HSBC Head of Liquidity & Cash Management, U.S. and Canada Drew Douglas. “We are excited for the launch and looking forward to expanding the breadth of currencies as we move forward and to introducing receive ‘like a local’ functionality in the very near future.”

Today’s news follows the launch of HSBC’s Global Money account in November of last year. Based on a similar concept, the Global Money multi-currency account enables the bank’s retail banking customers to convert, hold, and transfer multiple currencies from one account. Users can hold up to eight currencies at once and can send money instantly to other HSBC accountholders in more than 15 countries for free.

While the launch of a multi-currency account is a win for HSBC in today’s global economy, there is still one element notably missing– cryptocurrency. The multi-currency accounts that fintechs such as Revolut offer enable users to buy, sell, and hold multiple cryptocurrencies. While HSBC said it has “a pipeline of new currencies and enhancements,” the bank made no mention of future cryptocurrency plans.

Photo by Lukas from Pexels

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HSBC Rolls Out Recycled Plastic Payment Cards

HSBC Rolls Out Recycled Plastic Payment Cards
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Green Banking, HSBC

We’ve seen a widening range of ways that fintechs and financial services companies are responding to the global crisis of climate change. Finovate Best of Show winner Meniga, as just one example, teamed up with Iceland’s Islandsbanki earlier this year to launch its carbon footprint tracking, green banking solution, Carbon Insight. In March, we looked at 25 different fintech companies that were “going green” with initiatives that ranged from leveraging customer deposits to fund “climate-positive projects” to helping investors build portfolios of low carbon companies.

Today we learned that HSBC is commemorating this year’s Earth Day with news that it plans to eliminate single-use PVC plastic payment cards by the end of 2026. Instead, the bank will use recycled PVC plastic (rPVC), a shift already underway in markets like Malaysia and Sri Lanka. The new cards, part of HSBC’s goal of reducing its carbon emissions and reaching net zero in both operations and supply chain by 2030, are expected to reach the U.K. by summer, with markets in South Asia and North America – including the U.S. – getting the new cards by the end of the year.

“This is another step as we move towards a net zero business, to help the bank and our customers make a positive impact on the environment,” HSBC group head of retail banking products Richard Harvey said.

An issuer of 23 million cards a year, the transition to the rPVC-based cards is expected to reduce CO2 emissions by 161 tons a year. The switch will also result in a significant reduction in plastic waste — by 73 tons a year.

Not all who heard HSBC’s Earth Day message were moved, unfortunately. A small group of climate change activists broke windows at the bank’s Canary Wharf headquarters as part of a protest against HSBC’s business with fossil fuel-based companies. Nine women were eventually arrested in the protest, which was planned by a group called Extinction Rebellion.

And while the incident likely took some of the shine away from the HSBC’s environment-positive messaging, when it comes to Earth Day activism, it could have been worse …

Photo by Anete Lusina from Pexels

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Small Business Networks from American Express, Capital One, Advanta, Bank of America, QuickBooks, and HSBC

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Advanta, American Express, Capital One, HSBC, Intuit, Small Business, Social Media, Social Networks

Earlier this week, Visa launched its Facebook Business Network. While the first to use Facebook, several other major financial institutions have opened small biz networks on the Web in the past six months:

  • image Advanta’s Ideablob launched last September at DEMOfall (previous post here). It’s a unique website with monthly contests awarding $10,000 to the best idea, as voted on by users. It’s an intriguing concept with decent traction, almost 30,000 unique visitors last month according to Compete (see chart below). (Full disclosure: I just realized I’m wearing an Ideablob t-shirt; schwag can still pay off!)
  • image American Express’s OpenForum: As the name suggests, it’s a business forum and resource directory, not unlike Bank of America’s (see below). American Express has added posts from several prominent bloggers such as John Battelle’s Searchblog and Anita Campbell’s Small Biz Trends to keep the site fresh. The site has 5,400 members and monthly traffic of about 11,000 unique visitors, up threefold from a year ago.  
  • image Bank of America’s Small Business Online Community, a general forum and resource directory, launched in October 2007 (see original post here). It’s primarily a forum, with some additional articles on the side. Total membership is just under 15,000.
  • image Capital One’s Slingshot, launched in February, is primarily a business directory. But it does aim for community involvement with user-submitted business reviews and comments on certain topics.
  • image HSBC’s (UK) Business Network: Another forum-and-blog site similar to AmEx’s OpenForum. So far it appears lightly used, with just six blog entries this year and 270 member profiles.
  • image Intuit’s Quickbooks Group: Although not a financial institution, the Quickbooks site is a good example of an active community with more content, including ten blogs, and as much traffic as the others combined (not including BofA which is unknown) with nearly 90,000 unique visitors, almost double the number a year ago.

 Unique website visitors in May 2008 (source: Compete)

image

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Facebook Battle: Students 1, HSBC 0

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Facebook, HSBC, Public Relations, Social Networks

My teenage son has just starting "Facebooking," and he loves it. It's his first foray into social networking, and I can tell he'll be a user for the rest of his life, or at least until something better comes along.

Those of us who are merely parents of social network users often find it difficult to understand its power. In my son's circle, Facebook IS the Internet. It's where every online session begins and ends and where important social connections are made and nurtured. That's why strategic investors such as Microsoft, Google and others are said to be giving Facebook as much as a $10 billion valuation (see previous coverage here).  

All this has enormous implication for every retailer and service company on the planet. It amplifies word of mouth exponentially. Remember the old adage that every disappointed customer tells 10 people about their problem. With the instant broadcasting capabilities, an unhappy customer can now share his/her thoughts with 100+ Facebook friends with a single click (note 1).  

And it's not something that is 15, 10 or even 5 years away. It's happening today. Case in point: this summer HSBC (UK) was forced to reverse a policy change that would have ended a common perk for U.K. student banking accounts, a multi-year grace period for overdraft credit lines with limits up to US$3,000 (see HSBC student page here).

Local students were so taken aback by this change in account terms, they formed a Facebook group called, "Stop the Great HSBC Graduate Rip-Off" (here or see screenshot below). Apparently the group was planning to rally its 5,000 members into a little civil disobedience. The group was hoping to cause customer service headaches by flooding the bank's branches, and overloading teller lines, with student customers asking for detailed explanations of the new fees.

According to news reports (here and here), the bank quickly backed off the rate change and reverted to the liberal interest-free borrowing guidelines.

Implications
You should be using, tracking, analyzing, and brainstorming about how to tap social networks for sales, marketing, service, and recruitment.  

Note:

1. And the simple click-and-complain activity can be broadcast to every friend before the disgruntled customer has a chance to cool down (and/or sober up) and think through the issue in a more rational way.

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HSBC Joins the U.S. High-Rate Savings Account Race

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Deposits, Checking, Savings, CDs, HSBC

Hsbc_us_highrateHSBC’s U.S. unit launched a 3.50% APY savings account that competes directly with ING Direct (currently 3.30%) and other high-rate financial institutions. The rate is featured in an eye-catching red box smack dab in the middle of HSBC’s homepage (click on inset for a close-up). 

For more information on high-rate savings products, select Checking & Deposit Accounts from the navigation in the right-column of this newsletter. Also, read our latest Online Banking Report devoted to the subject, Lessons from the High-Rate Marketers (OBR 120/121).

Update 9/1/05:
The rate was raised to 3.75% today vs. 3.30% at ING Direct

—JB

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Financial Institutions with the Longest Online Archives

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: HSBC, Images & Online Archives

In the most recent issue of Online Banking Report, we outlined an important competitive feature going forward: online archives.

We sampled 50 financial institution websites and found the longest archives as follows:

Statements – 24 months at The Whitney Bank
Transactions – 58 months at ING Direct (since inception of the bank)
Images – 84 months at E*Trade Bank

Frost_logoWe’ve just been alerted that Frost Bank has real-time statement archives dating back to 1997, a full 100 months and counting. That’s nearly 5 times the length of our previous front-runner, The Whitney. And effective July 17, Frost will also have 18 month image and transaction archives, double the average length of our sample banks.

Finally, if you sum the archive length across all 3 types, Frost’s 136 (11 + 18 + 18) is the clear winner. Runner-up is E*Trade at 126. No one else is higher than 70.

Keep those cards and letters coming. Email me if you know of anyone who has longer archives than those listed above.

P.S. Another one we got partially wrong: HSBC provides 24 months of archives for deposit products and 12 months for credit cards. We reported 12 months for all.

—JB

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HSBC Right-Sizes Website Fonts

By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: HSBC

Hsbc_fox_utility_boxDo you get complaints that the copy on your website is too small?

First, make sure that you have not disabled the customer’s ability to control font size from their browser toolbar. This allows your savvier customers to easily change font sizes whenever necessary.

However, for the rest, who haven’t a clue that it’s even possible to change font size, consider adding a utility to your navigation menu that automates the process.

HSBC’s UK website features the above utility box on most interior pages, with the exception being the homepage. Not only can users easily increase/decrease text size (note the use of user-friendly language), they can also print the page or click through to the customer service contact center (itself a model of user-friendliness).

—JB

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