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Our objectives
We are dedicated in community investment through charity, volunteer services, etc., to enable younger generations to reach their full potential by developing their future skills and offering financial literacy. Hang Seng as well emphasises customer centricity and employee well-being to ensure corporate sustainability.
Long-term social impact
Hang Seng has been supporting the development of table tennis in Hong Kong for the past 30 years. In addition to nurturing 140 past and present members of the Hong Kong Table Tennis Team and Youth Squad Team, including 5 of the 6 core players of the Hong Kong Table Tennis Team at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Hang Seng Table Tennis Academy has provided table tennis training for over 65,000 students and reached close to 410,000 beneficiaries through more than 7,700 activities since its establishment in 2001.
We are delighted to witness the medal winning performances of the Hang Seng Table Tennis Academy’s graduates at the Tokyo Olympics and the Doha ITTF-ATTU Asian Championships. We donated HK$3.2 million cash prize to be shared by all members of the Olympic table tennis team to celebrate their outstanding performance and recognise their on-going hard work and commitment.
Key figures
ESG awareness: Published total 11 ESG topics in 52 postings in first half of 2022
Gender diversity: 67% of Board of Directors and 60% of Executive Committee members are female (as of August 2022)
Highlights
Community investment
As a home-grown financial institution, Hang Seng shares the drive, determination and dreams of the people of Hong Kong and strives to build a prosperous and sustainable future for the city. The aspirations and attitudes of young people play a crucial role in successfully achieving long-term sustainability goals. This is why Hang Seng’s approach to community investment places a strong emphasis on engaging Hong Kong’s young people and empowering them with the skills, knowledge and self-esteem that they need to thrive.
Hang Seng’s community investment strategy is designed around four pillars:
- Future skills
- Promoting sustainable finance and financial literacy
- Addressing climate change
- Caring for the community
In 2021, the Bank spent over HK$31 million in community investment, supporting local organisations to design and deliver 18 programmes for about 40,000 direct beneficiaries. We also made contributions to The Community Chest of Hong Kong to benefit another 2.5 million people.
We also invested non-financial resources and contributed close to 10,300 hours (equivalent to about HK$3.9 million) of volunteer time, professional expertise and practical support to further enhance our social and environmental impact.
Over the past 10 years, we have invested about HK$289 million in community initiatives.
For details of community investment initiatives, please refer to our latest ESG Report.
Four pillars
Future Skills
Young people play a significant role in the future development of society. We continue to put emphasis on providing future-skills learning opportunities for Hong Kong’s young people to help strengthen their ability to adapt and thrive in a fast-changing environment . This approach aligns with our business strategy of placing focus on supporting younger generations, who are integral to driving greater sustainability.
Hang Seng Youth Career Planning Scheme
Hang Seng - HKFWS Youth Mediation Scheme
Hang Seng Character Master Programme
Hang Seng – YMCA Balloon Twisting Programme for Special Educational Needs Students
Hang Seng Academic Assistance Programme
Hang Seng - Hong Kong Sports Institute "Community in Action"
Promoting sustainable finance and financial literacy
As one of the Hong Kong’s leading banks, promoting sustainable finance and financial literacy aligns with our core banking focus. We are eager to provide young people and their families with the tools and knowledge to manage their day-to-day finances and enhance their future financial security.
e$mart Financial Education Programme
Money Master Financial Education Programme
Addressing climate change
Hang Seng has been an advocate of environmental sustainability for many years. Our commitment to climate action is demonstrated through our support for initiatives such as the Hang Seng Yunnan Low-Carbon Village programme and we will continue to step up efforts in addressing climate change in Hong Kong.
Hang Seng Yunnan Low Carbon Village
Caring for the community
Hang Seng Bank has a rich tradition of acting to fulfil its social commitments as a responsible corporate citizen. We are proud of our long-term contributions to the community and of our active participation in a variety of social services initiatives to assist disadvantaged groups in our society.
Volunteer services
As a responsible corporate citizen, Hang Seng encourages its staff to give back to their local community. The Bank offers two days of leave for each employee to perform volunteer service.
In 2021, besides organising virtual staff volunteering activities to help people in need, we resumed physical volunteering whenever possible while observing safe social distancing measures.
We leveraged our core strengths and expertise, and organised an anti-money laundering training workshop for social workers of Tung Wah Group of Hospitals to enhance participants’ ability to help their clients avoid becoming involved in money laundering activities. We also supported the Hong Kong Association of Banks’ Financial Education Workshop initiative and delivered basic financial knowledge to the underprivileged community.
Overview
Our customer-centric service puts strong emphasis on building long-term relationships. Since 1933, our commitment to core values – professionalism, passion, and a prudent but progressive approach – has earned us the trust and loyalty of our customers.
Customer privacy
Ensuring the privacy of our customers’ personal information and other data is critical. It maintains our reputation for good governance and bolsters the trust that underpins lasting business relationships.
- We comply with the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance, have established Privacy Principles and, at our branches, offer privacy to customers who need to discuss sensitive or confidential matters
- We notify our customers about our collection and use of personal data, classes of transferees, and classes of marketing subjects, their data access and their right to correct personal data
- We have enhanced three controls since 2021 to provide transparency and choice to customers, and to comply with data privacy laws and regulations: Rights of Individuals, Privacy Notices and Consent & Choice
- In 2021, we hosted two webinars to enhance our staff’s understanding of data privacy issues in the digital era. The Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data in Hong Kong and speakers from an external law firm were invited as guests respectively
Customer experience
Digitalisation of Business
- To minimise customer waiting time at branches, eTicketing (Counter Services) has been extended to Chinese New Year new banknote exchange and eAppointment service has been extended to MPF service & Insurance solutions consultation since 2021
- We enhanced eTicketing services to merge Preferred & General queues in order to minimise customer waiting time at branches. These services greatly improved customer experience, and complement our efforts to combat COVID-19 by reducing queues and supporting social distancing
Improving the Online Banking Experience
- We enabled one-stop hub for customers to enquire and manage their credit card activities such as card repayment, e-statements, card loan applications, offers, report card lost, card PIN reset, etc. to drive digital engagement & sales conversion
- We enabled real-time card repayment & post-transaction display in all digital platforms in 2021
- We provide flexibility for customers to make eAppointment for Insurance services and MPF via hangseng.com; and provide eMeeting option “Zoom” function for insurance applications
- we continued to explore and develop new application programming interface (‘API’) collaboration with third-party service providers to improve customers’ online banking experience (e.g. Pay with Hang Seng) in 2021
- Our Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered chatbot HARO service was integrated with live chat in 2021, such that HARO is able to identify customers’ enquiry and channel it to live agents when human assistance is needed
- In 2021, the ongoing development of our digital capability and experience attracted and engaged more digital customer users. As of December 2021, we had close to 2.4 million personal e-Banking customers
Building financial literacy
- We strive to nurture young people’s saving habits and help them plan their finances for the future. The Savings Planner service in our mobile app allows users to keep track of their expenses effortlessly, with no data exposure to third parties
- As of 31 December 2021, more than 27,000 customers registered to use Savings Planner
Accessible banking services for all
- We adopt a barrier-free approach for all new branches and self-service outlets. Social Caring Counters at 22 of our branches provide priority service to the elderly, the disabled and other customers in need
- As part of our partnership with Hong Kong Seeing Eye Dog Services (HKSEDS), visually impaired customers can bring guide dogs into the banking halls of our branches. Some of our branches are HKSEDS training sites
- We increased the number of voice-navigable ATMs for visually impaired customers 281 in 2021. We also provide audible security tokens for visually impaired customers’ e-Banking
- Our 2 mobile branches provide access for the elderly and people living in remote areas
Overview
Our staff are the engine of our success and the primary bridge between our business and the local community. We reward them with competitive compensation and benefits packages, and engage them with supportive and flexible working conditions. Our training and development programmes cultivate professionals who contribute to our success and who understand sustainability in practice.
Equal opportunities, diversity and inclusion
- Of our senior leaders, 41% are women. This is well above the HSBC Group’s diversity target of 31% of senior roles being filled by women in 2021. Of our employees in Hong Kong, 58% are women.
- All staff receive training on diversity, inclusion, equal opportunities and human rights issues that are relevant to our operations. This is also part of our New Joiners Induction Programme. In 2021, we provided our employees in Hong Kong with approximately 5,922 hours of such training.
Training and skills development
We invest in training and development to build and sustain a professional, ethical team that contributes to the success of the Bank. We commit to deploying staff with sufficient skills, knowledge, professional qualifications, experience and soundness of judgement for the responsible discharge of their duties.
To empower our staff to develop future skills, we launched the CareerWise programme in 2021. Its features include:
- Rock Your Profile: workshops facilitate personal branding through LinkedIn® professional networking service profiles, and strengthen the Bank’s branding in the market, to attract talent
- Career KOL: external and internal key opinion leaders share career stories, reflections on their journeys and reality checks
- Talks-series Video: via video, different departments showcase their teams and personalities, and share interesting glimpses of wide-ranging roles, to help staff navigate development opportunities within the Bank
- Future Skills: A community of Future Skills champions was formed and mobilised across different businesses and functions to promote future skills learning in the Bank
Employee well-being
Employees who enjoy a good work-life balance are better equipped to perform well. Our staff are going through a variety work-life challenges at different stages of their lives. Therefore, we offer the flexibility to work from home, work part-time or take sabbatical leave, so they can fulfil their responsibilities as parents or caregivers.
Supporting flexible working
- We offer flexible working policy including flexible hours, hybrid working, work from home, part-time work, twohour personal time-off each month, Friday afternoon No Zoom meetings, and 3 to 12 months of sabbatical leave
- A Workforce Segmentation Exercise was conducted in May 2021 to properly assess risks and evaluate the suitability of each role including frontline and back offices for the Work from Home arrangement
Promoting health and wellness
- Our Employee Assistance Programme provides access to professional counsellors. This service – available 24 hours a day, seven days a week – is free and confidential
- We launched a new mobile app Benefit+ to enhance employee experience in medical e-claims by including their dependents. Video consultation with general practitioners, and delivery services for medicine have been introduced to make healthcare more accessible especially in the pandemic to provide critical medical consultation to employees
- In 2021, we organised leisure and recreational activities for our employees to enjoy time with their families. The themes included family care, parenting, pets, children, etc.
Freedom of Association
Hang Seng respects employees’ right to freedom of association and observes local legal frameworks. We consult and listen to their voice through employees’ representatives, focus groups, skip-level or cross-stream exchanges.
By way of example, we encourage employees’ participation and thus openly recruit them to be one of the members of the Retirement Benefit Management Committee. The representatives will be able to contribute their views and ideas on behalf of the retirement plan members, covering areas of investment review, cost management, communication and service providers. They also have the right to vote for the range of investment funds.
During organisational change, we will seek to redeploy employees where appropriate, provide training for re-skilling and career counselling to support their employability and explore opportunities internally or externally.
Occupational Health and Safety
We uphold high standards of Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S). We develop our OH&S policy and management framework by engaging employees at all levels via committees, forums and working groups.
Hang Seng Bank was the first bank in the world to be accredited Occupational Health Safety Assessment System (OHSAS 18001:2007) and subsequently migrated to Occupational Health and Safety Management System (ISO 45001:2018) upon its launch, certified by independent external certification body.
We organised two webinars with our Medical Advisor in March 2021 and renounced experts in October 2021 respectively to brief employees the various COVID-19 vaccines available, and answer questions from them on vaccination.
The Bank keeps its employee safe via various methods and control measures, for example:
- We established and continuously review COVID-19 Work Arrangement Guiding Principles and Procedures
- We defined and schedule different level of cleanings subject to business need
- We provided personal protective equipment to all staff at work
- We established cross-department taskforces responding to the latest development of COVID-19
By the end of December 2021, 85% of our employees were vaccinated and complied with the prevailing HKMA’s guidance on COVID-19 vaccination and COVID-19 testing.
Progress update
2nd quarter of 2022:
- Teamed up with Tung Wah Group of Hospitals Healthy Budgeting Family Debt Counselling Centre under their ‘Money Master Financial Education Programme’ to develop a series of videos to enhance young people’s digital financial literacy, cybersecurity awareness and money management skills
- Partnered with CarbonCare InnoLab and launched ‘Hang Seng Low Carbon Future - Low Carbon Schools’ Programme to reduce carbon emissions through the production and use of renewable energy
- Donated HKD2.4 million to install 140 solar panels generating approximately 82 MWh of clean energy each year at two schools by the end of 2022
1st quarter of 2022:
- Sponsored the organisation of a two-day Local Conference of Youth Hong Kong in February, in order to encourage more than 100 young people to discuss climate change, and exchange ideas on actions to tackle the pressing global challenge
- We distributed rapid antigen test kits, surgical masks and disinfectant products to 25,000 senior citizens and grassroots families in February