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Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

finance.yahoo.com

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Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#21

Post by willcipriano »

obblekk wrote: post #9

I feel so much cognitive dissonance realizing that there are hard working people literally losing their home and shelter wrongly while I might be sitting across from them at any time, expecting them to behave within normal social boundaries. Imagine a family with a new born, working 50+ hours at a physically demanding job, making $80k/yr combined, and then losing their home for no reason... and then being expected to…

I'm reminded of this song by the late Trevor Moore: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TMHCw3RqulY

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#22

Post by twblalock »

silisili wrote: post #17

Why is it -always- Wells Fargo. There are thousands of banks out there, and Wells Fargo is not even close to being the biggest. But why are they in the news every year for some illegal dealings? It feels like they should be broken up or something at this point.

The other banks are better at not getting caught. Wells Fargo has more scrutiny too, because of some previous times they got caught.

BofA or Citi or Chase are no different, they are just better at getting away with it.

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#23

Post by Tempest1981 »

So what's the least-evil bank that has a network of cash machines everywhere? (Yes, still need cash for certain things)

Edit: also with a non-buggy mobile app? My credit union has the worst app. They don't seem capable of improving it... probably outsourced.

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#24

Post by theptip »

twblalock wrote: post #20
ProAm wrote: post #8

WIth two massive scandals within 5 years I think this bank should be broken up as part of its punishment. It's clearly too big to run an honest consumer safe business.

What about the 268,000 employees who work at Wells Fargo, 99% of whom had nothing to do with this? Most of those employees are just normal people trying to make a living, and it would be wrong to screw them because their bosses, who they never met or had anything to do with, did something wrong. Shutting down a company is the nuclear option -- it hurts many people who did nothing wrong, including most of the employee…

Broken up != shut down.

Without advocating for/against the proposal, to clarify: typically this means either business units are spun out as smaller companies, or sold off to competitors. You’d expect some job losses due to consolidation but it’s not like you are closing down all of the branches and sending everyone working there home.

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#26

Post by threads2 »

obblekk wrote: post #9

I feel so much cognitive dissonance realizing that there are hard working people literally losing their home and shelter wrongly while I might be sitting across from them at any time, expecting them to behave within normal social boundaries. Imagine a family with a new born, working 50+ hours at a physically demanding job, making $80k/yr combined, and then losing their home for no reason... and then being expected to…

Reminds me of It's a Wonderful Life.

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#27

Post by twblalock »

theptip wrote: post #24
twblalock wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about the 268,000 employees who work at Wells Fargo, 99% of whom had nothing to do with this? Most of those employees are just normal people trying to make a living, and it would be wrong to screw them because their bosses, who they never met or had anything to do with, did something wrong. Shutting down a company is the nuclear option -- it hurts many people who did nothing wrong, including most of the employee…

Broken up != shut down. Without advocating for/against the proposal, to clarify: typically this means either business units are spun out as smaller companies, or sold off to competitors. You’d expect some job losses due to consolidation but it’s not like you are closing down all of the branches and sending everyone working there home.

How exactly would you break up Wells Fargo into a subset of businesses that had a chance of surviving on their own?

This is especially bad for a bank. Customers would freak out and leave. I can't find a single historical example of a bank breakup that didn't result in the destruction of the entire business.

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#28

Post by threads2 »

Tempest1981 wrote: post #23

So what's the least-evil bank that has a network of cash machines everywhere? (Yes, still need cash for certain things) Edit: also with a non-buggy mobile app? My credit union has the worst app. They don't seem capable of improving it... probably outsourced.

You could use a credit union.

Re: Wells Fargo to pay $3.7B for mistreating customers

#29

Post by phaedryx »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #5

I don't understand why anyone still does business with Wells Fargo.

A story from when I was in college:

My backpack got stolen and it had my checkbook in it. I went into Wells Fargo (I became their customer because they bought my regular bank) to figure out what to do. I was told that I had to close my account (connected to the checkbook) and open a new one. Kinda weird, but I went with it. They sent me a new checkbook and new ATM card. Landlord only took payment with checks so I wrote a check with my new checkbook; it bounced. It was really surprising because I thought I had the funds. I check with my balance with my new ATM card; plenty of money. I call customer service to figure out what was going on. It turns out that they had created two new accounts for me. One was connected to my checkbook and one to my ATM card. The one for my checkbook had a bunch of fines for the bounced check and fines for not paying the fines. The one for my ATM card had plenty. They tried several times to open another account to combine the two accounts together, which would have forced me to indirectly pay the fines that weren't my fault; I objected. In process of all of this they canceled my new ATM card accidentally.

I went into my local branch and withdrew all of my money and canceled all of my accounts (I had somehow ended up with 4). I ended up paying my tuition, rent, etc. with cash which was a huge pain.

It is the worst experience I've had with any bank and it was with many different employees.

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