Bank of America sucks!!!

[tomato]

Don't even get me started on ID theft.


Most companies do not protect people very well at all. All these companies making you key in your SS# and DOB in order to access your account or even talk to someone about your account?
Always ask for a subsitute number so you can enter that instead of your SS# if you can. Phone servers keep track of *everything* you key in.

I know, I'm off topic, sorry, my bad.

[Kioshi]

To OP: If you dont travel abroad and stay within your own state.....go with a credit union company., can't go wrong dude.....If you travel abroad or like to go to places outside the USA, you would want a big bank name....

I hate to say it, but I support Bank of America. I will tell you why I support them, but first off...on to the negatives...

BoA sucks because....
- they monitor your spending like hell. In Asia, esp. Japan, its good to use cash most of the time and not credit cards. SO Instead of getting charged a fee for withdrawl every time, i decided to withdrawl 50,000 yen each day (back at that time) so i dont have to make several trips to the ATM....
They shut my account down....i had to SKYPE them on a laptop to get ahold of them to activate my account back up again. I bought a Gucci purse for my friend and after that purchase, they shut my account down AGAIN. I called them up again and got it activated. Last day before i leave Japan, i withdrawled some money and it was closed again....

Mind you i had missed my flight, and because i couldnt take money out, i had to suffer at a 24/7 internet cafe to get my flight the next day. Fuck them....

Good stuff......

I've had 3 fraud scenarios....and all three of them...BoA has refunded me my money. A couple questions and then BAM i have my money back, no hassle. Also, my parents were in a credit crunch.....i talked to the general manager of the company......he politely asked me what was wrong with our bills and payments..what is the story, divorce, etc? I explained him the story and kindly he said he wanted us to be part of his company for years to come.....
He lowered our monthly payments and REDUCED the debt to more than 60%.....
And for that i appreciate BoA more than any bank out there.....THAT meant a lot to me.

WaMu/Chase...had ONE fraud charge...and they hassled me over the phone like my family was the one being accused...WTF? You dont do that to a customer.....

Point is....pick a bank, stick to them. Credit Union - good for the state within. International: bigger banks...

I hope my bad experience and good experience helps you and others pick a bank thats good.

[slothman86]

Navy Federal Credit Union.

[SilverBack]

So BofA is now $9/month eh? I'm glad I left them 10 years ago when it was $5 and joined WaMu. Even with the name change to Chase, I still haven't had any problems

[Shroomster]

Originally Posted by k r a y z e e . j o j o

So BofA is now $9/month eh? I'm glad I left them 10 years ago when it was $5 and joined WaMu. Even with the name change to Chase, I still haven't had any problems

apparently we had been sending our payments for cable to an old address and the mail was getting forwarded. we never received notice of this and when chase finally switched us over to their online banking we got charged late fees by the cable company. was really a mess.

[Lafiro]

Don't credit unions keep a percentage of your money?

My g/f takes I believe $250 out of each paycheck to put aside, for a credit union.

I never understood though if they keep some sort of profit or not?

Either way for me this doesnt apply, my account with my community bank is completely free, just no interest. Which is fine with me.

[DevilGirl]

Originally Posted by Lafiro

Don't credit unions keep a percentage of your money?

My g/f takes I believe $250 out of each paycheck to put aside, for a credit union.

I never understood though if they keep some sort of profit or not?

Either way for me this doesnt apply, my account with my community bank is completely free, just no interest. Which is fine with me.

I use a credit union here in PA. Unfortunately, the only branches are like 2 hours away from me. However, I have used local bank ATM's to make deposits at no charge, and I almost always can find some "fee-free ATM" to make withdrawals.

As far as the keeping a percentage of your money thing, my credit union only withholds $5 from me. That's all. And that is the same $5 used to to open the account many years ago.

[TLyttle]

Yup, Credit Unions. Better than that, if you have money that you wish to invest, the CU is standing right there, and you are investing in your own community, not some overseas gamble. Decades ago, I got stung by a CU, but it was a dishonest employee, and the situation was very complicated. Otherwise, I have yet to hear of any problem with Credit Unions; don't you wish you could say the same about the banks?

[EleKid]

Fuck. I gotta change my bank now.
Citi is doing this thing where you get 100 cash and 100 gift card if you deposit 1000 in a new acct or 50 cash if you deposit 500.
I'm not sure if you have to get it done by someone you know though. My friend said he has to be the one to do it but he could be just saying that to get commission.

[Darb]

Wow... I've never had an issue with BoA, at all. They've actually been my favorite bank to work with. Wachovia and United suck.

I guess my only gripe is that they don't have any banks in Pittsburgh.

[Kioshi]

EleKid, a lot of banks, esp. up here were doing this. I know Bank of the West gave you $100 just for opening an account with them.

They will get commission probably, but getting money to deposit that amount isn't bad...of course i dont even have $1000 to deposit lol.. You have to go through your friend or someone working there...

Darb - other than the problems I mentioned earlier, i haven't had much from BoA...been w/ them since 2004..

[Darb]

Originally Posted by Kioshi

Darb - other than the problems I mentioned earlier, i haven't had much from BoA...been w/ them since 2004..

Yea, I've been with BoA for awhile now, too.

[SilverBack]

Originally Posted by Shroomster

apparently we had been sending our payments for cable to an old address and the mail was getting forwarded. we never received notice of this and when chase finally switched us over to their online banking we got charged late fees by the cable company. was really a mess.

I knew I didn't trust online banking for a reason. I usually just get my bills paid through the autopay system of each billing company and not the bank itself. If something changes or goes wrong I'll always get an email from the company right away.

[BailOut]

BofA has had problems for quite while now. When my wife and I first met over 10 years ago her account was with BofA. Her debit card number was her login to their online banking system (!) and her pin code was the password (!!!). I griped to them about this early on and was rebuffed.

Fast forward to 2000. She was still a Windows user at the time and there were no less than 4 cookie exploits for Internet Explorer. I again warned BofA about it and they basically told me that I didn't know what I was talking about. Within weeks many mainstream websites that served off of the Windows platform has been compromised and were combing visitor's cookies when they used IE.

Sure as hell, 3 weeks later a charge showed up in our account for a losing $1,000 bet at an online sports book. I checked out the sports book's site and they didn't even require an expiration date, name or anything else for a transaction... just a credit card number.

BofA took 3 weeks to give us our money back, and when they mentioned they would issue my wife a new card we said, "Don't bother." and merged our accounts into Wells Fargo.

In 2003, 2004, 2006 and 2008 we read of BofA being grilled, both publically and by Congressional committees, for mischievous practices such as always putting a hold on checks (even interbank transfers), processing debits before deposits (in order to make the account bounce), stacking the highest debits first (in order to make more transactions bounce, thereby generating more penalty income for them), etc.

Now in 2009 we read of their CEO resigning after a surreptitious and bungled merger with Merryl Lynch at the peak of the recession and while they were receiving taxpayer-funded bailout money.

Why anyone maintains an account with them is beyond me. We've not missed them once since we left them.

Originally Posted by tomato

that's why I stayed with WF. ATM *everywhere*

That's true, but only as long as you don't go east beyond Texas. Wells simply does not exist in the east.

Let me provide you with some warnings concerning Wells:

- Any transaction that favors the bank will take place either immediately or overnight; any transaction that favors you will take 2-5 business days.

- Each Wells branch has a Banker. The Banker is responsible for running the branch, has the final say on loans, etc. They are intended to be the lifeblood of the branch. However, our local branch turns over Bankers faster than Taco Bell does drive through workers. Our next-to-latest one outright lied to me in telling me that our checking account type would now bear interest, and said such interest was a higher rate than even their best accounts provide. He also told me that we would have to pay some fees for their best account which I soon learned was inaccurate as we have our home mortgage through them, which automatically qualifies us for the better account. If you can't even trust your local Banker...

- Our last home insurance carrier made a mistake and double billed our Wells Home Mortgage escrow account for our annual premium. Wells paid it without checking, and the insurance carrier refunded the extra cash to me instead of placing it back into escrow (I'd rather not even do it through escrow but since it's a VA loan it is mandated). This should have been an easy thing to correct but it took no less than 6 phone calls, 3 emails, 2 snail mails, 2 visits to a local branch, 3 escrow analyses and 11 business days to correct.

For these reasons I am almost through migrating us to a new bank.

Originally Posted by EleKid

I gotta change my bank now.
Citi is doing this thing where you get 100 cash and 100 gift card if you deposit 1000 in a new acct or 50 cash if you deposit 500.
I'm not sure if you have to get it done by someone you know though. My friend said he has to be the one to do it but he could be just saying that to get commission.

Aside from how slimy the setup with your friend sounds allow me to provide you with an outright warning against Citibank. For 2.5 years we had a Shell Mastercard via Citibank that gave us cash rebates for anything we spent on it. We used it in the most responsible way possible, meaning we used it in place of a debit card but paid it off every single month. Of course, the credit card industry refers to people like us as "deadbeats" because they don't make any extra money off of us (they still make per-transaction fees at the merchant level, and money still changes hands between Shell and Citi for handling the account, etc.).

Without any warning they shut off our card last Tuesday. It wasn't just us... thousands of Shell/Citi customers had their accounts closed. We were all given some bullshit excuse that it was "something on your Experian credit report... a change in your FICO score". What made no sense from the start was that I'd just pulled our credit reports not 10 days earlier (a semi-annual event) and not only was nothing negative shown, but our FICO scores had gone up by roughly 30 points due to refinancing our home and some other dealings. Your FICO score is also not a static measurement, but a constantly evolving number. I mentioned all of this to the Citi CSR and he made it clear that it only said "something" on my Experian report, not necessarily something negative.

The accounts were closed, conveniently, on the 13th, because the billing cycle ends on the 14th and that's when they would normally disburse everyone's rebates. The fine print in the contract lets them keep the rebates if they close the account for any reason.

So, aside from the hassle of losing our primary credit card, we also lost over $50 in rebates that were due to us.

While the closure of our account was just a nuisance imagine if it had happened on someone's way home from out of town, or trying to catch a flight or buy a bus ticket, etc., and having it be their only source of funding at that time. After all, it's the sole card I used to carry.

This is not my first dealing with Citi, but it is indeed my last.

----------

I have migrated our savings to ING Direct and am almost done migrating our checking, primary credit card, home insurance, auto insurance and flood insurance to USAA, which is where I should have been all along. No company is perfect but their motto is "People before profits", they are not publically traded (so there are no shareholders to pressure stupid decisions or to force a short term view), they took no bailout money, they have no branches but let us deposit checks from our mobile phones and home computer scanner, they let us perform 10 ATM transactions per month on anyone's ATM at no charge, and they refund us up to $15 each month of whatever fees the ATM owners charge.

Sadly, USAA is not open to everyone. It is only available to active duty military personnel, veterans, and their descendants.

I also just signed up for an American Express Blue Cash card because I don't want to get stuck having our only credit card ripped out from underneath us like Citi just did. I will be adding a 3rd card, likely from a local credit union, in order to add some extra credit security and to help out our FICO scores by keeping less than 30% of our total available consumer credit used at any moment.

[TLyttle]

Wow. A bank is offering YOU money to open an account???? DINGDINGDINGDING!!! Alarm bells, can ya hear 'em??

[Shroomster]

Originally Posted by BailOut

I also just signed up for an American Express Blue Cash card because I don't want to get stuck having our only credit card ripped out from underneath us like Citi just did. I will be adding a 3rd card, likely from a local credit union, in order to add some extra credit security and to help out our FICO scores by keeping less than 30% of our total available consumer credit used at any moment.

Good choice on the Blue cash card. I've had them for I think 4 or 5 years, and not once have they ever done me wrong (yet). I've had several transactions fall through and they've found on my side (because I had documented evidence)
all the times and never questioned me about it. plus the cash back is nice after 6k in spending you receive 5% back on most everything (sans wal-mart and the like)

I've always been under the guise of I don't care what the apr is unless I can't afford it.

[advocate]

Originally Posted by Shroomster

two words:

Credit Union look one up near you

Shroomster has it right Jason. BOA is the reason we're in a financial crisis right now. My entire family are members of Technology Credit Union. They have a good amount of local branches and have always done right by me.

www.techcu.com gogo

[YarisSedan]

Bailout after reading your post i just looked into and applied and got approved for a american express blue cash i love that 5 percent cash back. Am going to open a checking account with my local credit union the same that finanaces my car. And turns out they have a no free checking account that no only that offers .25 percent on top. I mean wow. And then once i migrate all my money there i am going to open and orange savings account. I love that 1.25 percent on my savings. Talk about making your money work for you. So now i will be gaining interest on my normal every day spending and my savings isntead of having it cost me.

I just called my bank and acted all nice and got them to reinburse me for the 8.99. But plan to still close my account once i have a chance to open one at my credit union on my day off.

From now on im going to use my american express blue whenever possible. Even when i have cash in pocket and then just pay it off every month. I typically spend about close to 10 grand a year between me and my fiance on normal every day expenses such as gas, groceries, eating out etc. That comes out to be 500 dollars cash back at end of the year. Thats free money.