FAQs: HSBC International Education Payment

Customers from mainland China, Hong Kong SAR, Macau SAR and Taiwan who are HSBC Premier, Premier Elite, Global Private Banking or Advance account holders with HSBC China are eligible to use this service through our HSBC China Mobile Banking app or WeChat Service Account. Please be aware that when using this service, customers from Hong Kong SAR, Macao SAR and Taiwan are required to comply with rules and restrictions under the foreign exchange regulatory, and may not use their RMB holdings under this service to pay tuition fees for international education.

Renminbi payment is only available within service hours (9.30am-6.00pm, Mondays to Fridays, excluding public holidays), but foreign currency payments may be made at any time. For special holiday arrangements, refer to our website or mobile banking notices. The cut-off time for renminbi payment on the working day prior to a Chinese holiday is 4.00pm. Foreign currency payments are available 24 hours a day.

Customers with HSBC Advance accounts are required to pay USD7 or its equivalent in other currencies for each transaction. Other eligible customers can enjoy the service for free. Please check 'Tariff of Accounts and Services for Personal Customers' for more details.

You are strongly recommended to allow more than 2 weeks to process remittances. In addition, your designated receiving institution may also require additional working days to process payment. If your payment deadline is approaching, we recommend you use other payment methods which are more direct.

The HSBC International Education Payment System is available for major educational institutes in Hong Kong SAR, the US, the UK, Canada and Australia. When using this service, you may search for and select your corresponding school/educational institute from the list of 'Billing Schools'. This list will be updated from time to time and the list at the time of use shall prevail.

If you're unable to find the billing school in the list, click 'Submit school information' to inform us. Once we receive your request, we'll confirm whether the school can be added and inform you within 2 working days. Do note that the service might not be available for all educational institutes and you may be notified that we're unable to add the particular school to the list.

a. Log on to the HSBC China Mobile Banking app, go to 'HSBC international education services' on the homepage and select the 'International Education' option.

b. If it's your first time using the HSBC International Education Payment System, enter the school's English name in the search bar.

c. For regular users, select the 'Immediate payment' option or choose the receiving institution from the 'List of payees'.

d. Fill in your payment information.

e. Confirm and submit the payment information.

Prior to confirmation of instruction, the foreign currency exchange rate used by HSBC International Education Payment System is the reference exchange rate, which is provided as a reference for the amount of payment required. You'll need to confirm the real-time exchange rate when setting up the payment instrument and making payment.

A reference exchange rate is the exchange rate provided as reference for the corresponding amount of foreign currency you require before the confirmation of your payment instructions.

A real-time exchange rate is the rate upon which the exchange rate and the actual amount of payment are based, and it appears on the payment confirmation page.

The available annual FX quota is based on the remaining balance of your personal annual FX quota. The amount, in USD equivalent, may be calculated based on the reference exchange rate at the time of enquiry, and is for reference purposes only. If the amount of international education expenses required to be paid exceeds the personal FX quota balance, the payment will not be successful.

You may log on to the HSBC International Education Payment System and check your payment status under 'Payment record'. We'll also send you a notice via the International Education Payment System's 'Homepage Notice', as well as the HSBC China WeChat service account (you should receive an advance notification from the 'HSBC China Customer Service' HSBC China WeChat service account). If you don't get a notification from the HSBC China WeChat service account, please log on to the HSBC International Education Payment System to follow up on your payment status.

When executing your payment instructions, we'll also send respective emails to you and the specified school to help enquire about and confirm your tuition fee payment.

We suggest you keep a record of the relevant notifications sent to you by the school concerning tuition fee payments. You may also directly contact the school regarding your payments.

You may log on to the HSBC Mobile Banking app/WeChat service account -> HSBC International Education Payment System -> Payment record to check the status of your International Education Payment System instructions. The following scenarios may occur as your payment status in your payment record:

1. Payment instructions have been processed - The time required to send and process payment instructions depends on the location of the school. You are strongly recommended to allow more than 2 weeks for this process. Please directly contact the relevant school to confirm if payment is confirmed.
   
2. Payment failed - The relevant payment has been returned to the foreign currency account corresponding to your name. If you've not opened a corresponding foreign currency account with us, please contact us for assistance. You may also re-submit your payment instructions.
   

If your payment has been rejected by the receiving institution (or the bank of the receiving institution), your payment will be returned to your foreign currency account. If you used your renminbi account to make the foreign currency payment, the payment will be credited to your foreign currency account (unless you did not open a foreign currency account of the corresponding currency).

Once you've successfully used the HSBC International Education Payment System to make payments, we'll create a list of payees under your account. If you pay tuition fees for the same student in the same school, you may execute your payment instructions without having to fill in the required information again.

If you've successfully used the HSBC International Education Payment System to complete your payment for the first time, we'll create a list of payees for you (including receiving institution and student information). When you make a payment the next time (to the same receiving institution for the same student), you only have to fill in the type of foreign currency, amount, and payment order number for that payment.

The payee's record under the HSBC International Education Payment System is comprised of both the student's and the receiving institution's information. Altering any one of these items requires the addition of 'New receiving school and student information'.