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Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

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Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#161

Post by Terr_ »

pjdemers wrote: post #96

I used to have a side gig as the CFO for a not-for-profit (an unpaid volunteer). Anyway, this organization was over 125 years old, associated with a larger organization 80 years older than that, and had the same primary bank for 70 years ... Anyway, my treasurer, who was very smart, insisted we keep enough cash to run for 3 months in a secondary bank. Just in case we were locked out of our primary bank.

Not quite the same scenario, but it makes me think of how a startup I know dodged a bullet with the Silicon Valley Bank collapse [0] partly due to having some other money elsewhere Just In Case. (But in a major part due to bailouts, of course.)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collapse_of_Silicon_Valley_Ban...

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#162

Post by 77pt77 »

CliffStoll wrote: post #26

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…

Many decades ago I transfered my money from the USA to Europe. Nothinf much but I didn't want to cross borders with wads of cash even though it's perfectly legal.

I had to give my origin bank everything imaginable, including address, phone, fax of both the destination bank as well as the branch.

All of my ID obviously and the destination account number.

Weeks later I get a message from my destination branch saying they got some money in USD for someone that had a subset of my name but no account information whatsoever.

I said it was for me and thankfully that was it.

What happened?

Eventually I got something that looked like a traceroute of the transfer.

The origin bank used Citibank as an intermediary and at that step everything but the amount, name of the destination bank and my first and last name was lost.

Completely obliterated.

Never trusted them ever since.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#163

Post by 77pt77 »

arcanemachiner wrote: post #130
calmbonsai wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, Citi. Related to an earlier comment I posted on a different thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41316889 , I didn't name the "national bank", but I now feel perfectly comfortable outing "Citibank" as the national bank that I will no longer (personally) do business with. Corporate stuff is a different matter. As a matter of policy, they do not empower their front-line (personal) banking CSR reps, and even…

Couldn't hurt to keep an eye on the account to make sure those dummies don't start tacking on some "account dormancy fee" or other nonsense like that.

Or just go down the Wells Fargo road and start opening accounts on his behalf.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#164

Post by aspenmayer »

AshamedCaptain wrote: post #50

"Computer says no" is the one customer support response that makes me move my business elsewhere.

For those unfamiliar with the reference:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_says_no

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0YGZPycMEU

For niche, zany sketch comedy, Little Britain is a gem.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#166

Post by ethbr1 »

calmbonsai wrote: post #97
CliffStoll wrote: post #26

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…

Ah, Citi. Related to an earlier comment I posted on a different thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41316889 , I didn't name the "national bank", but I now feel perfectly comfortable outing "Citibank" as the national bank that I will no longer (personally) do business with. Corporate stuff is a different matter. As a matter of policy, they do not empower their front-line (personal) banking CSR reps, and even…

> As a matter of policy, they do not empower their front-line (personal) banking CSR reps

This appears to be the original sin in most of these scenarios.

Eventually, automation and predictive analytics will break.

If you do not have a customer service org empowered and staffed to (a) investigate what went wrong & (b) make it right, then you will lose customers.

And maybe you're fine with that trickle, but know that the Kafkaesque burning of a relationship means they will never do business with you again.

For all its faults, Amazon is an example of a company that still remembers this and seems to empower its support folks. As a counterexample, I severed a 20 year relationship with Bank of America because they disempowered their retail staff to the point of uselessness.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#167

Post by eduction »

blcknight wrote: post #70
otteromkram wrote: post #37

[flagged]

You might be surprised to know you don’t need residence or a visa to hold a bank account in the US Blaming OP is totally unhinged

Surely you can understand how a bank would be more skeptical about an account holder who lives in a different country, is a citizen of another country, etc? Not saying he deserved it (Chase sounds pretty infuriating) but similarly saying something is legal is not the same as saying it should not be a fraud/crime flag.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#168

Post by bluGill »

syntheticnature wrote: post #20
mminer237 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's definitely exacerbated by being a big bank though. If I have a problem with my local bank, I can literally walk into the branch and probably just talk to a VP about it straight-away if needed.

Yes, though banks use "VP" in a title the same way "Senior" is used in software.

This is a legal thing - a vice president or above is required to sign off on a large loan (like a house loan which isn't all that big to a bank). Thus banks give lots of people vice president titles, but those people don't have any authority except to give the large loans. They get an impressive title though.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#169

Post by bluGill »

nottorp wrote: post #165

Stupid question from outside the anglosphere: what's the difference between a bank and a credit union?

Credit unions are owned by the people with money in them. A coop bank.

There are a few other legal differences as well, but the ownership is the big difference.

Re: Cautionary tale on using Chase bank for indie business

#170

Post by Brian-Puccio »

nottorp wrote: post #165

Stupid question from outside the anglosphere: what's the difference between a bank and a credit union?

Credit unions are nonprofit, member/cooperatively owned financial institutions.

Banks are for profit (and likely publicly traded).

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