For the actual availability score climbs to Barclays

France, 31 of individuals who hold more than 50,000 euros of liquid savings are unhappy with the financial services available to them (study McKinsey for Barclays). The explanation Rather fortunate, they are often not enough to walk the carpet of the private banks (accessible from 150,000 euros in financial assets in LCL, 250,000 in BNP Paribas, 500,000 to La Banque Postale, 1 million to Société Générale, etc.). And most institutions (some exceptions in the table below), it deals with "intermediate", as any customer profiles. In the best cases, it offers advisors so-called "heritage" (more experience and less than customers), as in BNP Paribas or LCL.

The success of offers "first."

That is not escaped the foreign competitors, including HSBC and Barclays. Five years, these two British banks have launched called offers "First" to attract the wealthy French in recognition evil (more than 4,000 euros monthly income and at least 50,000 euros of financial assets). The key, advisors personal reachable without hot line or queue, clear visual codes marking the belonging to a select network, liquidity well paid, and the insurance find everywhere in the world the same quality of service. Success: the Cape of the 300,000 accounts has been crossed in June last for HSBC. And Barclays, with means - just 53 agencies in France less against 420 for HSBC and 1,600 employees against 10,000-, has also built a nice position. "On client 170,000 French, we have now an astounding 62 first, which won over 17,000 in 2009", welcomes Tony Blanco, Deputy Director-General from Barclays France, which aims 111.000 accounts first end 2013. Of course, it is still far from the 1.1 million "heritage" customers of Crédit Agricole or 2 millions of faithful "high" that claims the Société Générale, but HSBC and Barclays, which remain almost only to provide dedicated services (read below), may yet snack a few shares of market.

How to identify them Side tariff, the balance favours first Life of Barclays: almost everything is free. If you domiciliez more than 3,000 euros monthly income, the establishment offers you prestige card (Mastercard Platinum, with janitorial services) and, as a bonus, a paid current account. Council, the promise of the two institutions is the same: experience and training for client managers, free historic appointment (minimum once per year) and support of lawyers and tax experts for technical issues. For the actual availability, score climbs to Barclays. The establishment will have year of 630 (850 planned end of 2013) "first" advisors for 65,000 customers (i.e. 103 accounts by pro, against 500 in HSBC).

For international, HSBC prevail on the other hand largely with 17,000 distributors in the world to remove free of charge and opening an account in three days in the country of destination for expatriation. Even you will enjoy discounts on consultation "international tax" at Deloitte. For the rest, the two banks free supports changes in banking domiciliation. But those who are reluctant to deposit their cheques by mail will prefer HSBC (eight times more ATM).

Barclays Awards

Attention, the match is not finished! To publicize first Life, Barclays encourages the sponsorship until 19 March (gift of luxury or high-tech for the sponsor and 100 euros for his godson). And propose as soon as next month applications for "smartphone". In the rival, the response has already been developed: the HSBC Advance formula has just been launched to find affluent clients... in the egg. "For the 25-45 years, collecting more than 35,000 euros of gross income a year, it offers among others a paid booklet 2 gross (HSBC 2A) and admission fees reduced to 0.5 on the programmed investments", summarizes Pierre Antraygues, Director of client strategy HSBC France.