I Love Stodgy Bankers

Shortly after I first moved to California, I got an account at Washington Mutual. I went with them because they had a no interest/no fees/no math/no hassle account and they gave me overdraft protection. I’ve banked with them for a long time, but it appears that one of their goals for this year is to get rid of all their long-time customers.

March 13, 2006, they launched a media blitz campaign which is theoretically about how opposed to traditional stodgy bankers they are. The television spots and billboards show paid-looking guys in pinstriped suits chomping cigars and being penned up in what is apparently WaMu’s basement. The ad campaign is designed by advertising powerhouse Leo Burnett and directed by Martin Granger, of the Moxie Pictures production company, who is also apparently responsible for the creepy Burger King ads. The main thrust of the supposedly humorous spots is, according to a Business Wire press release, intended to point out how non-traditional WaMu is in the normally stodgy banking world. This is just my opinion, but it strikes me that the message comunicated is that only losers bank at WaMu, that people with any clue how to handle their dough put it some place else.

I’d like to say that there are many areas of my life where I follow the excitement. I want to hang out with people who take risks and look for adventure. But I don’t necessarily want them handling my dough. Think about who you would most like to go on a bender with in Vegas. Now imagine that person holding all of your money. Doesn’t exactly give you the FDIC-insured warm fuzzies, does it?

Now it might be humiliating to pull out the loser-branded bank card when shopping in Los Angeles, but I’d probably get over it, if Washington Mutual hadn’t simultaneously started to do seemingly everything in their power to irritate long-standing customers.

First, WaMu took most of their customers in California and I believe also Washington and Oregon and turned off their Visa cards and send them Gold MasterCards in place of them. On the phone, a WaMu rep told me to just tell her what my recurring transactions on the Visa were so they would know to honor them. Needless to say, ‘cause I’d hardly be writing this article if they’d taken care of me, WaMu failed to honor any of my recurring transactions. This included nonessentials like my car insurance, warehouse space, and videos-by-mail subscription. WaMu personnel assured me that, despite the numerous inconveniences, there were many advantages to having the new MasterCard they had forced on me. The first half dozen or so WaMu people I complained to directed me to consult the literature they had sent me to discover the advantages they were sure existed, even if they couldn’t think of them. Turns out, the Gold MasterCard is, you know, sorta sparkley yellow-toned instead of blue. I like the color blue better. (Forrest Black wishes for Blue Blood readers to know that those with Platinum Visa debit cards didn’t even get a color change when forced to switch to MasterCard.) After extensive complaints research, I found a supervisor who advised me that the MC has a higher spending limit for accessing my own money for a day’s purchases. That seems like it would be a WaMu limit, rather than a Visa vs. MasterCard thing, but, okay, that is a plus. Then they tried to claim that MasterCard is accepted at more locations worldwide than Visa. Now, I won’t pretend to having been to every corner of the earth, although I have lived on three continents and in five countries, so it is possible that there is some godforsaken territory, unfamiliar to me, where MasterCard is the preferred mode of payment for machine guns and gruel. But I’m pretty sure that I know the main arena in which MasterCard would be accepted more places than Visa. You see merchants who are purveyers of adult material and gambling and similar products have to pay a hefty fee to Visa each year, so some opt to solely accept MasterCard. I’m not much of a gambler though. Supposedly, despite rising fees, there might be a few other benefits to the MC, but they are not available to longtime customers. Yes, you read that correctly. WaMu is giving preference to new customers over loyal ones. I really think WaMu needs to come up with something to offer as compensation to all their customers who had to deal with having their perfectly good debit Visas turned off.

Second, Washington Mutual stopped accepting a large percentage of deposits made at the ATM. I get a lot of little checks and it is difficult to keep track of who has paid me, both for my own records, and for tax purposes, unless I have a separate record for each deposit. Part of the original appeal of WaMu to me was, as I said, the ease of no fees. I prefer to bank this way and banks which charge for every deposit make me feel profligate for doing so. I’m willing to give up the interest on that account for this convenience. Welll, no dice any more. Washington Mutual ATMs now accept only a couple of envelopes before displaying a message saying the customer is over the $100,000 daily limit. I’m not saying I’d mind if my checks added up to that, but as these sorts of desposits don’t, the first time it happened I thought the ATM was broken or or perhaps possessed. Turns out this is WaMu’s oblique way of saying that they want to limit how many deposits any customer can make in a given day. None of their phone personnel or in-bank customers service workers appear to be briefed on this policy, so I get a different answer every time. Although their tellers are extremely irritated by the longer lines inside the bank and the grumpier customer base. The phone people suggest that it is Federal law that the first $100 of any deposit be made available right away. Others suggest that the amount is $100 total in a given day is all that Federal law requires. If the former is the case, then it looks like Washington Mutual is looking to have more float with their customers’ money. Short explanation of float is that, by forcing their customers to combine eight deposits in one envelope, then they would only have to make $100 available right away, instead of $800, but they would still get use of the money. If anyone knows the answer to the question about what the actual law is, I would muchly appreciate accurate info, and I haven’t had any luck getting it from my bank.

Oh yeah, and Washington Mutual redesigned the insides of a bunch of their banks to be very unbanklike, so that other people are all up in your business, tellers are actually out in the middle of the bank, and the money comes from these weird open kiosks. I don’t even have the words, but fortunately for me, there is an unrefurbished branch fairly close to me and I drive out of my way to make my deposits. I wouldn’t normally have to enter the bank, so normally I’d be indifferent to bad interior design and horrible traffic design, but I have to go inside to make my deposits now, which also means I have to make them during bankers’ hours.

So Washington Mutual is not a small bank. What can you do if you are one of their legion of disgruntled customers? According to their phone support, who admittedly have been wrong before, WaMu will change its policies if enough customers express their opinions.You can phone (800) 788-7000 and press zero a bunch of times and you will eventually get a human being on the line. In order to change policy, it is not sufficient to express your opinion. No record will be made of this. You must request that they fill out a complaint form and you may need to wait for a supervisor to come on the line for this. This is probably the best option if you dislike WaMu limiting your ability to make deposits or if the MasterCard thing has been a problem for you. If you are annoyed by the incredibly annoying anti-stodgy bankers campaign, its Cold War Communist charicatures, its possible racism, its possible sexism, its implications that all WaMu customers are losers, or anything else in the litany of complaints I’ve heard and read about that campaign, then you are probably better off contacting Mary Kelley at Washington Mutual. Her phone number is (206) 377-6878, but I’m probably going to personally just email her at mary.kelley@wamu.net because I am shy on the telephone.

I’ve asked Washinton Mutual employees over and over again where the stodgy bankers are, but they refuse to tell me. If they keep implementing structures which functionally might as well be designed to drive me away, I’m willing to go. Anyone got some suggestions? Because I want to bank where the traditional bankers are steering the ship.

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Posted by Amelia G on July 25, 2006. Filed under Blue Blood. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry