Well, first of all, if you are US based you get paid in USD. The check book you are able to get for your HSBC acct is a HKD check book (I'm only speaking as a PowerVantage customer with HSBC). To get a bank check written in USD for you will cost you something like $80HKD or there abouts. This again relates back to actually being in HKG just after your pay comes in and you are heading straight home to then cash the check. If you have the flexibility to do this and not need the money straight away, then fine.
If you were to change your USD to HKD online (read loss of money through commission etc) and then write yourself the check in HKD.....I would imagine most banks won't cash a non USD check from a foreign bank anyway, and if they did, they'll probably hose you for commission and put some ridiculous hold on the funds in the meantime.
I've signed up with ETrade in the US and will report back on how it goes. Note that ETrade HKG told me they only deal with the brokerage side of ETrade US and not the banking side, so if you are going to try the transfer this way, it will only work to a brokerage acct and not a ETrade bank/checking acct. Other brokerage/banking options I've checked out in the US recently that have pretty good deals as far as no fee for incoming wires, interest on checking accts, ATM fee refunds etc. are via
www.schwab.com and
www.everbank.com. They all along with ETrade brokerage and checking have similar setups with minor differences. One thing I like about the Scwab setup is that they will give unlimited refunds on ATM fees using their debit card worldwide. They'll (as far as I can see) refund those costs once a month. Anyway, lots of different options. At the very least, nobody should now have to pay for the cost of receiving an incoming wire (if you are, change banks....or open a separate acct via one of the ones suggested here) to get your pay to the US.
I wish we had this discussion years ago! (Thanks again Alohajec
)
FYI