LGBT New Account Opening Mystery Shopping

he research is designed to make sure that individuals are happy with the application processes used, and that they are not found to be discriminatory in any way.

As part of the research we would ask you to open up a new bank account with HSBC – either face-to-face (in branch) or via telephone – to the point of actually opening the account. Following this we would ask you for your feedback on how the journey went.

We appreciate your time is precious and are offering incentives of £100 for completing the mystery shop. This includes a branch visit, and one of the following:

• A telephone application for an HSBC current account (should take around an hour) followed up with a local branch of HSBC visit to hand in ID (should take 5-10 minutes)
• An online ‘pre-task’ of filling in the online application (should take 3-4 minutes) and then going into branch to go through the application face-to-face (should take around an hour).
• An online ‘post-task’ of filling in the online application (should take 3-4 minutes) after a face-to-face branch visit to go through the application (should take around an hour).
• Once respondents have been recruited,  a researcher from will call and email them to brief them with instructions as to exactly what they will need to do as part of their task. The researcher will brief fully over the phone though to clarify the exact process before the respondents actually do anything.
• All respondents will be required to complete the application, and will be credit checked. They will need to make a quick call within the cooling off period to cancel the application. Their credit check will be wiped within 5 weeks (to 3 months) – in most cases within 5 weeks and will not impact on their credit score.
• All respondents will be called by the researchers to undertake a 30 minute follow-up telephone interview after they have completed their mystery shop.

Looking for 7 people aged 18 to 50, according to their sexual orientation as follows:

• 2 x gay females
• 2 x gay males
• 2 x bi-sexual respondents (gender as it falls)
• 1 x transgender respondent (gender as it falls)

All to be London based and comfortable to open a new bank account via telephone.

None to already have  a bank account with HSBC.

If you’re interested in taking part in this project, please enter your details below, then click on the “Register For This Project” button at the bottom of this form.

Once we receive your application, if you fit the basic criteria, we will contact you for further screening before you’re selected to take part.

You will only be contacted if the answers you’ve provided meet the criteria for this project and we have spaces left on the group – if you do not receive a response then you are not required to participate on this occasion.