“Sounds like Bank of America to me.”
Bingo. I tried to cash a check at BOFA a year or so ago for $3,000. You would have thought I was robbing Fort Knox. The teller looked at the check like it was a snake then called the Head teller over. First they tried to say I had opened my account in another state. I said no I had opened it in Atlanta. Then they tried to say I hadn’t had the account very long. I said isn’t 17 years long enough? Then the head teller asked me why I wanted to cash a $3,000 check. I told her it was none of her business and just give me the money. Finally I told her if they didn’t give me the money I was going to close the accout and take all the cash out. It was bizarre!!!!! They finally cashed the check like they were doing me a special one time favor. I closed the acct out a month or so later. I can only imagine how much worse it has gotten since then.
An old friend of mine had a business partner/mentor who was pretty successful.
His daughter had authorized access to one of his accounts. She was going on a trip, and she stopped at the branch bank at the airport to get some cash; I think it was a thousand or so (this was around 40 years ago).
The teller told her that her account didn’t have any money in it so she couldn’t make any withdrawal. The daughter had never been told this before, so she got her dad on the phone.
He talked to the teller and then the teller’s supervisor. They didn’t know what a “zero-balance lockbox account” was, so he had to explain it to them. It was an account that kept a zero balance, but payouts from the account would automatically trigger a transfer of the required amount from a backup account in his own name. He further explained to them that he kept an average of $750,000 in the backup account, and if they didn’t get their act together on the spot he’d pull all his finances from that bank.
After calling “downtown,” the teller and her supervisor finally came to Jesus, and gave the daughter her cash.
I closed my BoA account almost 9 months ago. Live in a small SC town in the upstate. Everyone knows everyone. Plus my wife is very good at estasblishing a personnal relationship with bank employees.
Long story short, the manager asked why we were closing the account. We told her we had lost confidence in BoA. We said we were sorry it had come to this and that it had nothing to do with the local branch or people. The problem was the ongoing reports that BoA was in trouble and that it persisted in making large numbers of subprime loans.
The manager was very gracious. So our experience was nothing like yours.
We switched to the one and only small and local bank in town. The owner had been picking off the best people from BoA and an S&L over the years. Very competent staff. The bank follows all good bank practices. The only down side is ATM access. We get four withdrawals a month from any ATM fee free. After that we’re liable for the fee. So far we’re doing fine with that.
I have American Express to use if we’re traveling and exceed the 4 ATM withdrawals. Since we pay off our AMEX bill every month this amounts to a no charge transaction.
“Bingo. I tried to cash a check at BOFA a year or so ago for $3,000. You would have thought I was robbing Fort Knox. The teller looked at the check like it was a snake then called the Head teller over. “
Tell me more about the check. I assume it was made out to you. Did you sign it or did someone else? Was it drawn on another bank?