Similar experience: Citibank Retirement. I had about $80,000 in IRA/CD's. I'd created & contributed to them over a period of 35 years. Last year, it's time to retire, and Citibank won't give me half the money. It seems that some CD's are for "Cliff Stoll" and some for "Clifford Stoll". Citibank Retirement demanded a "Marriage Certificate, Divorce Decree, or Court Order" to demonstrate that "Cliff Stoll" is the same p…
Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
131–140 of 282 posts
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#132I have been burned by a bank (stagecoach in red field) very similarly. I now only do my financial transactions with smallish credit unions. Big enough that they can have the services I need, but small enough that my business is a large-ish part of the Unions' business. This works internationally, not just US or Europe. Most nations have some sort of a member-owned financial cooperatives, equivalent to credit unions.
Why would you say "stagecoach in red field" instead of Wells Fargo? I don't get why people are so coy about calling out terrible companies by name publicly. They're not going to kick your door in and shoot your dog. Do you think Wells Fargo (the terrible shitty bank) is going to actually search through HN looking for instances where users said their company name "Wells Fargo" and linked that company name "Wells Fargo…
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
Who said you have to deal with a bank? That's not written into law, is it? Try a credit union if you want to avoid banks.
Is the experience that different? I've never tried one, but I assumed the level of bureaucracy must be similar in order to defend against fraud and fulfill regulatory requirements.
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
what... what did you doo...
Usually just accepted the documents/lawsuit, then drove up the mountain to give it to the intended recipient. The first time this happened, business was closed... so I just taped it to the door (and then the owner came out LIVID, thinking I was the process server ...). Only once did the process server actually look on his phone to see that there were in fact two same-addressed properties (and obviously mine was resid…
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#135Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#136Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why would you say "stagecoach in red field" instead of Wells Fargo? I don't get why people are so coy about calling out terrible companies by name publicly. They're not going to kick your door in and shoot your dog. Do you think Wells Fargo (the terrible shitty bank) is going to actually search through HN looking for instances where users said their company name "Wells Fargo" and linked that company name "Wells Fargo…
I presume you are either in the US or Europe. I understand your point. Alas, not everyone is based in countries where civil liberties are not completely eroded. That said, even in the US civil cases with or without merit can destroy a business and individual.
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#138This is why Bitcoin is ideal. You can hold and transfer any amount, any time of day, without fear of surprises like this. Would I use it as a primary cash account for my business today? No, because of the obvious exchange rate/price swings. But long-term, moving toward Bitcoin as a settlement layer (i.e., a modern SWIFT) would solve a ton of problems and avoid situations like this. The more people that do that/normal…
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#139I feel bad for the people who went through this Kafkaesque nightmare. > After months of back-and-forth, [...] I finally got my money. I didn't find any mention of a lawyer in the article. When you realize you're dealing with people who aren't operating in good faith, seriously consider consulting a lawyer. (A harder problem is realizing when people aren't operating in good faith. Especially if you're a Pollyanna, or…
One option is that the author found/got a referral deal with an alternative provider, so thought they could write this article complaining about a competitor.
Or... They were so pissed with Chase due to this nightmare they had to go through, they looked for alternatives, found something, so they mentioned it in the post.
Disregarding is fine as you don't know if they are honest, at the same time I wouldn't attribute evil intentions either.
It's like when a native iOS developer says the best apps are truly native. It could be that they tell you that so that you hire them and their niche stays strong... or they really believe it and that's why they are iOS developers.
Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business
#140This is why Bitcoin is ideal. You can hold and transfer any amount, any time of day, without fear of surprises like this. Would I use it as a primary cash account for my business today? No, because of the obvious exchange rate/price swings. But long-term, moving toward Bitcoin as a settlement layer (i.e., a modern SWIFT) would solve a ton of problems and avoid situations like this. The more people that do that/normal…
I don't see why having a different settlement layer would prevent the bank from freezing money that they have custody of.
Long-term, if everyone does larger transactions in Bitcoin (e.g., payroll, invoice payments, etc), then problems like this never occur.