HSBC.COM - HSBC Finance


About HSBC.COM
 

HSBC Finance Corporation is a financial services company and a member of the HSBC Group. It is the sixth-largest issuer of MasterCard and Visa credit cards in the United States. HSBC Finance Corporation was formed from the legal entity that had been known as Household International, and is now is expanding its consumer finance model via the HSBC Group to Brazil, India, Argentina and elsewhere.



HSBC Finance Corporation’s subsidiaries primarily provide middle-market consumers real estate secured loans, auto finance loans, MasterCard and Visa credit card loans, private label credit cards, personal non-credit card loans and specialty insurance products.


Operating under the HFC and Beneficial names, HSBC Finance Corporation is the second largest consumer finance company in the United States, with more than 1,300 branches in 46 states.
 
It provides a variety of real estate secured and unsecured loans to primarily non-prime customers, as well as increasing numbers of other product lines such as auto loans and service plan policies.

HSBC Finance Corporation has a Canadian operation which it inherited from Household International, since the HSBC acquisition the Canadian subsidiary works increasingly closely with HSBC Bank Canada. The unit offers mortgages, personal loans and insurance through 115 branches in 10 provinces and via merchant relationships.


United Kingdom - HSBC.CO.UK

In the United Kingdom, HFC Bank is a sub-prime consumer lender. Its branch network consists of around 150 Beneficial Finance branches. Since Household International's acquisition by HSBC, HFC Bank has worked increasingly closely with HSBC Bank plc particularly for cross-selling purposes.  FOREX ROBOTS


HFC also provides retail finance for stores such as John Lewis, Currys and PC World. The Marbles and Beneficial branded credit card portfolios were sold to SAV Credit Limited in October 2007. In January 2008, the Financial Services Authority fined HFC £1,085,000 for failing to take reasonable care in its sale of Personal Protection Insurance. Beneficial Finance is renowned for its predatory sales tactics.




The more dubious consumer finance companies are held to engage in the following practices.


  • Failing to tell people who ask for a loan from the lender that they really have good credit and can get a better deal somewhere else (a subprime loan is usually more expensive than a prime loan). This is one of the primary criticisms of industry and is implied in many others critiques. For example consumer finance companies have been called racist because of branches they might have opened in primarily African American areas. If their customers all had bad credit they would be working in the same way they would elsewhere, but it is implied that they are preying on the communities' lack of knowledge of lower priced alternatives.
  • Sending live checks through the mail which when used become loans. This can trick some people, and the interest rate is usually purposely high (although disclosed)
  • Charging very high fees on a mortgage refinance.
  • Offering refinance deals that are worse than the previous loan, usually by showing that the new payment will be lower, but not revealing that the new payment does not include taxes and insurance.
  • Selling single premium credit insurance, also financing that into the loan

Critics consider also the concept and geographical placement of consumer finance stores as a form of "redlining". This is because the sub prime lenders in poorer communities will often be the only local store, yet will be higher priced.


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