They wonder why we don’t like them

With the ongoing Occupy demonstrations going on around the country, I’d like to tell two stories about working with banks. Neither of these stories involves large sums of money or great issues, but it is the little things like this that leave us with a negative attitude towards financial institutions. Issues of substance are now magnifying that attitude.  

The refinancing

About a year ago I decided to refinance my house to take care of lower interest rates. I was not taking any cash out, nor was I lowering my payments. The only objective was to cut down the repayment term to pay the house off faster.

I immediately locked the interest rate for 90 days and sent the requested document dump to Bank of America. Then I waited. After a couple of weeks I got an additional document request from a new loan officer. My first contact was no longer on the transaction.  My second loan officer only lasted one day, having apparently left the company about the time that my folder landed on her desk. There was a mix up with the third loan officer, and my refinancing ended up on the desk of a fourth person.

By this time the bank had lost many of the original documents and I was asked to resend them. Several times.

The fourth loan officer was not on the scene long, nor was number five. Because of the churning of the loan officers Bank of America had to extend the 90-day rate lock. Upon the extension I had to update all of my documentation. 

After four months and six loan officers we closed the loan. The final insult of this story is that at the closing we were given the option to have our checking account automatically drafted each month to pay for the loan, and the bank would only charge us $4.00 extra per payment for the honor.

I’m an accountant. I know that the ACH transfer that the bank would use to draft our account is much cheaper for the bank to process than the paper check we would be sending. Yes folks, the bank was charge us $4.00 per transaction to save THEM money. We declined their generous offer.

The checking account

Until last week I had a checking account at Citibank. Two weeks ago I received a notice in the mail that Citi was raising its service charge on checking accounts to $15 per month. The letter also let me know that as long as I maintained a minimum savings balance, I would not be charged – and congratulations I had that minimum balance. After a checking account is set up maintenance on the bank’s mainframe has a negligible cost. I could understand a per check charge – processing checks costs money. But $15 per month just to maintain the account is unconscionable. Although the account would have cost me nothing, I have now closed my Citi checking and savings accounts and am one of the newest members of my local credit union.

We all have a choice. Don’t let yourself be treated like a sheep to be sheared. Don’t do business with companies that don’t value you as a customer.