Comments on: Bank of America Horror Story - Part 2

By: Kevin J McCormack

Kevin J McCormack — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 17:46:06 +0000

I saw the story this morning ,(9-24-08) of two former empolyees of BofA. They were in a call center and told thier “horror” stories of what thier job required and what thay “had” to do. I applaud them both for leavinging and for telling the TRUTH.
I was at one time an employee of First Card, Bank of Chicago….one of the most reputable companies in the business.. not only were they fair with thier customers but also appreciative and fair with thier employees . I worked for them in a New York office. I was asked to help them expand and move to Springfield,Mo. to help train and bring up a new location. I agreed.
All was great for the first several months until Bank of America mergered and changed All the rules !
We were no longer to be honest and polite to our customers, take our time to assure our customer was satisfied, but to be ” done in one” .. lie if we had too ! We had to meet “calls per hour and monetary quota”. (”We had to keep our jobs”) . We had to meet the customers concerns, sell new products ( they did not need), advise of all new available services , (some of which were not ready to be offered), we were to try and increase thier credit line and ” guarantee ” them a low percentage rate…all this in less than three minutes !!!! Any call back from the same phone number for clarification jeopardized our job and left us up for possible termination or future reprisals. The stress nearly killed me. I was accussed of not being a team player and saw many of my coworkers fired. I finally resigned . Several years later, I took a position with Chase Bank,located in New York, another reputable company whose moto was ” customer service first “. Once again I was asked to relocate to help bring up a new site. I agreed. This time I moved to San Antonio, Tx.
Again, after several months in Texas, BofA mergered and took control. ” All customer service ” went out the window ! We were back to extremely tight rules and demands… answer the phone, handle the call, sell, get off the line and take the next call….you were timed,audited,held responsible for lost calls, and reproached and threatened if you did not bring in ” x ” amount of dollars per call. Being no masochist I fulfilled my contract with the bank and I quit.
I still reside in Texas, a much smaller town, a much smaller paycheck. I work as a provider for the handicapped and also as a stained glass artist. I do not make the salary I use to, I do not get to travel I as use to. I am not as stressed as I use to be, but I do love going to and coming home from my job. I do give customer service and spend as much time as needed to satisfy my customer.
They are happy and so am I !
I’d rather take my time, make those I work for happy, take a smaller paycheck, have less stress in my life and know that I work for “job satisfaction” and NOT “who can I screw today”.
Again, I applaud those two ladies for standing up to the ” high and mighty ones”, the corporate ” parasites”..the one’s whos only concern is “THIER Wallet” and not thier empolyees or thier customers.
Sincerely relieved to get this off my chest,
Kevin J McCormack

By: Hut Loan

Hut Loan — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 15:30:01 +0000

I had a spell where my paycheck (direct deposited to BOA - they are rather constricting…) was less than usual and through my own fault (procreastination) I ended up being too late to change my automatic billpay payments and they went through, sending my account into 3 digit negativity…

I get these emails from BOA customer service telling me to take action on these payments before they get returned for insufficient funds, so I take a ClickBank commission check for over $600 and deposit it at a drive through window on my way to work.

The teller tells me they have put a hold on my check (I deposit ClickBank commission checks every two weeks since May of 2007, and they never put a hold on them) for 7 days and that only $100 of the deposit is available. Well that doesn’t even put a dent in the negativity in my account, and the payments are all reversed. Then my direct deposit hits my account and since my account was negative, I did not have enough left over (without the $500 that I deposited to prevent this from happening) to cover the automatic bill payments for this week. After about 50 emails to customer (dis)service, I get the same reply each time telling me that holds are placed because of several reasons:

“The decision to place a hold is based on many factors, including the
account history and overall customer relationship. For example, how long
a customer has banked with us, account balance maintained, whether items have caused nonsufficient funds and other factors.

“Although there is no guarantee holds will be avoided in the future it is
less likely when you:

- Have an established account history
- Maintain higher average balances
- Have no nonsufficient funds, returned items or overdraft items
- Continue to expand your relationship with the bank”

Great, but they could have handed my check back to me and allowed me to deposit it once my direct deposit went through.

So I am now at the point where the $500 will be available, and there still won’t be enough money for the bills because of the over $200 in fees that I just paid.

I am shopping for a new bank… or I may just go to all paypal and etrade.

By: Insurance Business Banking

Insurance Business Banking — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:46:30 +0000

What makes people prefer commercial lenders to traditional banks for business loans?…

A businessperson requires continuous cash flow to ensure that his business operations run smoothly. However, it is always not feasible for every businessperson to cope up with the monetary requirements through his savings. There are times when borrowin…

By: Credit Card Services

Credit Card Services — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 03:09:36 +0000

Credit Card Services…

I couldn’t understand some parts of this article, but it sounds interesting…

By: Accept Credit Cards Online

Accept Credit Cards Online — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 17:39:12 +0000

Accept Credit Cards Online…

I couldn’t understand some parts of this article, but it sounds interesting…

By: Mike Petton

Mike Petton — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 17:30:33 +0000

usery is what it is….. a good customer always on time with payments for 4 yrs and suddenly intrest jumped to 26.99% because of some elusive mistake in my past well before them…………….

By: SYLVESTER SMALL

SYLVESTER SMALL — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 20:07:05 +0000

I HAVE MAINTAINED A CREDIT SCORE OF 720 . I APPLIED FOR AND RECEIVED A VISA FROM BANK OF AMERICA IN AUGUST OF 2006 W/ NO INTEREST FOR 6 MONTHS . AFTER THAT IT STATED THE INTEREST WILL BE 10.99 . THIS VISA HAD A $10,000.00 LIMIT . AT THE END OF THE SIX MONTHS I NOTICE THAT THE INTEREST RATE WAS 22.99 % . I IMMEDIATELY CONTACTED BANK OF AMERICA AND ASK WHY THE VISA WAS 23.99% . THEY INFORMED ME THAT IT WAS A VARIABLE RATE AND IT CANNOT BE CHANGED . BEAR IN MIND THAT I WAS NEVER LATE ON ANY PAYMENTS EVEN THOUGH I ACHIEVED A HIGH CREDIT RATING . I PROMPTLY PAID THEM THE $6000.00 I OWED THEM IN ONE INSTALLMENT AND TOLD TTHEM TO KISS MY ASS .
BANK AMERICA IS REAL GREEDY ,SO I SEE WHY THEY’RE TARGETING THE HISPANICS . MANY HISPANIC IMMIGRANTS DONT REALLY UNDERSTAND INTEREST RATES . MANY OF THEM ARE POOR MIGRANTS WHO DON’T HAVE A THIRD GRADE EDUCATION AND BANK OF AMERICA KNOWS THIS ,BUT THIS IS ONE AMERICAN THAT BANK OF AMERICA AND THE GREEDY CORPORATE EXEC WONT RIP OFF . DONT TRUST THEM AT ALL .

By: DataPoohbah

DataPoohbah — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 01:03:57 +0000

Oh yea BOA blows big time.

I almost went to work there once, or at least the part of their business that handles credit cards for retail.

What a goat screw that place was on the inside.

This doesn’t surprise me one bit.

By: Schweigenthaler

Schweigenthaler — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 03:32:15 +0000

I have been doing BofA online banking for over six months now. The results are:
1) missed business rent payment. My building office called and asked why. With them on the phone I asked BofA rep. Answer: It looks like we sent it to the wrong address. We sent it again. It hadn’t. It got there over a month late.
2) Double bill and warning from health insurance. Call and explain I have had some online problems. Everyone does, says the person. We advise Kaiser members not to use BofA online banking.
2) Last straw, probably. Today I get a bill for the second half of my home owners insurance. Log in to BofA and see that the payment to EArthquake insurance is canceled. I did that, then paid half the year. It did not go through. I can’t get earthquake insurance for another two years.
4) Ditto Chase Manhattan Credit card. I paid the charges and cringed thinking of the credit report. Called customer service regarding another $9 charge. “We get this now and then, he said. The last guy is suing Bofa.

I need to take myu business to another bank.

By: Connie Mendoza

Connie Mendoza — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 20:46:52 +0000

I sooo Agree with you. I applied for a credit card thru Bof A and was denied. BUT I got a letter oh I would say days latter asking if I wanted a secure credit card, that I should fill out this form mail it with $ 99.00. So I did. Approximately a month latter I get a letter regretting that it was refused for NSF, BUT I sent a money order (because I do have a problem balancing my check book) So I call every number given to me. Bottom line, last person I spoke to tells me, ‘well the money order must have been STOLEN! She has no record of me paying anything, but if I got a letter telling me that there was insufficient funds than, I stole the money order. So I refused to pay for transactions I paid in advance but yet they didnt collect till weeks latter. I don’t know how they have become the largest.