Workers of HSBC and former predatory lender Household International may face oppressive financial problems of their own in the future. Faced with high gasoline prices and huge home heating costs, these workers may have a hard time paying their own bills. Why? Their jobs are going offshore, mostly to India. HSBC announced on Wednesday, March 16, 2005 that it already has 13,000 workers in call centers around Asia. But chief operating officer Alan Jebson said he would be very surprised if less than 25,000 people were working in them over the next three years.

As Household International and HSBC Chairman William (Bill) Aldinger pushed hard for bankruptcy reform in the US, his own workers may soon seek protection under new oppressive bankruptcy laws. It may be a long cold winter in South Dakota and Delaware for soon to be unemployed workers at HSBC, which owns disgraced lender Household International, “I don’t have a precise target but I would be surprised if we had less than 15 (global service centres) in three years’ time,” Alan Jebson told reporters. All would be outside the US and UK. UK workers at HSBC will also be effected.

Analysts at consumer watchdog organization Household – HSBC Watch said most of the unemployed will likely come from the United States. “It costs much less to process auto loans in India than San Diego California” the group said. (The group does not condone the exportation of predatory lending and they oppose any loss of US jobs.) “Workers at former Household International facilities from California to Kentucky, and from South Dakota to Delaware will be speaking out soon about what really went on inside the company” some sources say. Regulators say they can’t wait. Employees think they will be bound by non-disclosure agreements. “One thing is guaranteed. The first person to write a book will make millions” said Household – HSBC Watch.

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