I've had a HSBC Platinum Mastercard for some time now, with an annual fee of $59. CL is $1550. By far my smallest CL.
Got the new card in the mail recently (old one expired in September), but did not activate it. Went on line to my account and there was the $59 fee. I called HSBC "customer service" to either get them to waive the fee altogether, increase my credit limit, or close the account. I told the rep that I would expect at minimum a $6000 increase (to $7550).
The rep said she couldn't waive the fee, and went on to tell me that the fee was there so that I could access my account on line 24/7, that it covered the cost of their reporting to the CRA, and other such nonsense. When I told her that I had several $10K cards that didn't charge me a fee at all for the same "benefits", she put me on hold. Several times. Tried to transfer me to a different rep (presumably a retention person), but couldn't reach anyone.
So, she said she couldn't waive the fee (it hit my credit report a few days ago), and apparently didn't even look into the CLI. I have a stellar history with them and my credit scores are certainly not an issue. I'll check later to see if they pulled any reports. Bottom Line: I closed the account. Not gonna pay $59 for a $1550 CL. The loss of $1550 won't hurt my utilization very much, and probably won't be missed at all, since I'm going to request a CLI from my Wells Fargo card.
Guess HSBC/Cap1 didn't want my small business, or to grow my account to match my prime cards. No great loss to me...
