Down and dirty drawers

I side with you Robert, better to not be working for a bank. Seems these days that the goal is to teach the employees to eliminate their jobs. It goes something like this, Mr Soandso, did you know that you don't have to come into the bank? You can simply use our out doors ATM and in short order the bank will no longer need me any more.

The freaking key grips that call the shots are clueless about customers that want to see the same faces when they walk in. The customers want to get some level of service for their 19 cents they are being paid for their $15,000 in minimum balances.

Hope she gets a better job soon!

Reply to
Leon
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Me, too. I was self employed for years, then took a job and actually worke d for a bank (the old NORWEST banking system) managing and developing home construction and permanent loans.

They tried to cut my pay simply because I made more money than the two Texa s Vice Presidents. The reason? I was on mostly commission, didn't play go lf, hand ball, or have two hour lunches. I put loans together and collecte d my commissions. Had I done poorly, they wouldn't have noticed me, but th e green eyed monsters whined to upper management about being "fair" since t hey had seniority, and they almost got me. My solution of course was for t hem to give up their salaries and get out in the world where 90% of their p ay was commission. You know, "no worky, no eaty". Their solution was to c ut my pay to retain "parity". My attorney's solution was much more jolting to all of us, as he dared them to cut my pay based on my high production.

Not long after that, I was gone. Nine months after I left with my producti on and my pending loans, they were gone.

Assholes. Idiots. Morons. But the risk of having no job was a chance the y would take rather than to see someone get ahead that they thought didn't deserve it. They never understood that if I wasn't successful and didn't b ring in loans, I would never have made the money I did.

You bet I do!

Thanks for the good wishes, Lew. I am hoping it is better than the last fe w have been. And same back at you!

Robert

Reply to
nailshooter41

----------------------------------------------------- Interesting.

Can't remember the last time I was in a bank.

Standing in line for 15-20 minutes waiting to get to a teller comes under the heading of ridiculous in my book.

Forget even thinking about going to a bank on a Friday.

Lew

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

My wife worked for a bank until about a year ago. They were always looking for some way to cut corners and about six months ago they bought out everyone over 60. If she'd waited six months to leave, they would have given her a year's pay. :-(

Because of the economy, she's been unable to find a job. Even the banks aren't hiring. Amazingly, no one even wants volunteers, at least no one that doesn't want you to pay for the privilege. She will probably take her measly SS in the spring, when she turns 62.

Reply to
krw

On 11/6/2013 2:31 PM, Leon wrote: ...

Credit Union, I presume.

Reply to
dpb

On 11/6/2013 12:23 PM, snipped-for-privacy@attt.bizz wrote: ...

That certainly varies by bank. Some are very commercially oriented, others, sorta' in between and yet others are very much interested in the personal banking.

How much of which tends to correlate with size and regionality of the operation altho even some of the very large have branches that concentrate on local/personal arenas.

Best personal service if that is what one is looking for is quite likely going to be found with the local or smaller regional bank, not BOA or W-F or somesuch.

Reply to
dpb

Sure, it varies a lot by bank but people are not their purpose. They're "commercial banks". Credit unions are run by people for people (and yes, they vary a lot, too). Ours happens to be very good, so we've stuck with them for 40 years, over 20 of that living in a different state.

+1

OTOH, I have a CC with a megabank. I only have it for its cash-back.

Reply to
krw

...

Nonsense.

CU's have their place certainly, but they're not _necessarily_ any panacea, either. We dealt w/ a decent CU in TN, but the local bank here is far better.

Reply to
dpb

We came from an Ohio credit union for more than a decade to a TN credit union for more than a decade. We had a time between where we were with a bank, a good bank that came highly recommended and had a great reputation. They SUCKED!

Everything about the bank sucked compared to both CUs. Lousy service, fees, lower interest rates, did I mention fees?

It's like going from riding the bus to a private limo. We will never go back.

Reply to
-MIKE-

Just because you've had a better experience at CU's doesn't discount someone else having a better experience at some bank.

Reply to
none

On 11/6/2013 9:36 PM, -MIKE- wrote: ...

...

Well, that may have been; we were w/ a TN CU for 25 yr 'til returned to family farm in KS. The bank we're using here (local, independent) is _far_ more friendly, serviceable and less expensive. The fees are less than were paying the CU in TN.

OTOH, there's a branch of BOA here that has all the issues they're known for nationally on a smaller scale--how they remain open is beyond my ken, but for some reason they do. Inertia on most peoples' part I suppose altho we took Mom's account from there shortly after returning--the personal account was still there because it, too, had been a local bank until having sold out some time ago and gone thru a half-dozen or more transitions before finally the last group of which it belonged was one that BOA bought out.

Again, it's all in the actual institution, not a generality.

Reply to
dpb

It's not.

That's a rarity. What about the CU there?

Reply to
krw

As a generic statement it's worthless--there are very good, mediocre and very bad CUs just as there are of everything else. There were three large ones in TN that each filled one of the niches...the third actually ended up folding and was absorbed by the second not long after we left.

Not in my experience it's not, no. Then again, I don't deal with the major banks but smaller, local ones where I know the people involved directly outside the bank as well.

There have been some of those everywhere I've lived; large communities as well as small.

Again, there are some but none for which am eligible that would consider using instead of the bank. We do have some funds there--grandparents and parents were cofounders and I have a $5 bill there from the same time in the late 50s still there... :)

Reply to
dpb

A lot depends on where you live. The nearest town to me has a population of 7100. Most of them all work in one of the big cities so it's pretty quiet during the week for those of us who choose not to work.

MikeM

Reply to
Mike M

"Lew Hodgett" wrote:

---------------------------------------------------------- "Mike M" wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------------- Living in a major metro area puts a different spin on things.

When I came to Los Angeles, looked around for the bank that had the most ATMs.

No surprise it was BOA.

After using a savings account as a parking place for spending money available thru ATM for a few years, BOA offered a free checking account if you opened it with a direct deposit tied to it.

NBD, so now have a free local checking acc't with direct payment of most bills paid as req'd.

I'm left with 1-2 paper checks per month and no need to go into a bank branch.

Don't miss having to stand in line.

The nearest BOA has five (5) ATMs and anytime I've peaked inside the bank have never seen more that three (3) tellers on the windows.

Think there is a message there.

Lew

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

Lew mistakes the _real_ reason to go into the bank isn't to do the routine business w/ a teller but to visit with the prez, catch up on the local "more businessy" news in town in factual context don't get at the coffee shop from the street, and otherwise connect w/ another significant portion of the community...again, this presupposes using the local bank with a local presence not the outside interloper chain that has no interest in the community other than what can ship back to main office from there.

If self-employed it's even more critical to have the interaction in good times as well as calling in the bad.

Reply to
dpb

OR... maybe Lew has the same situation I do. I have banked at the same ban k for over 30 years. People come and people go. I live in a town of about 1.3 million when including the metro area, and San Antonio TX is usually #

7 or #8 in population size in the US depending on the reporter.

YEARS ago I had the same bank officer for some time. But that all changed as did the way banking is done here in TX. We use the branch system, so wh ile you might be talking to a branch manager, so you light years away from talking to the "Prez" of the banking system. Some tiny state banks might s till have a president in the bank, but I doubt it.

And since a branch can be set up with a good computer link, a nice vault, a nd a tiny space inside to service customers that actually want to come in, bank branches are relatively inexpensive to open. So in my neck of the woo ds the expansion of all banks is ceaseless. They go through people rapidly , promoting those they like, training for different positions to increased their value to the bank, and then of course losing them due to the low wage s paid to the rank and file.

Since I have been with the same bank so long they actually assign a rep to my account. The rep usually lasts about 9 months to a year, sometimes long er, but is just a rep. Gone are the days of relationship banking where I c ould call my guy, get a few thousand put in my account and stop by later in the day to sign the papers. As it is, I am lucky they waive all fees and charges to the account.

Self employed for 30 years now, I don't see the need to go in the bank. It is a wasted of time to me to interface with people that will be gone in a few months when my banking requirements are so low these days. And I only g o by the bank a mile from my house when I am paid on a job and make a depos it on the way home, or to get some cash. Unless you are living in a rural e nvironment, the folks that work in the branch are pretty much just place ho lders. If you don't believe it, go in and ask your favorite guy (that you have known for years)for a $10,000 personal loan and see how long it takes to get it.

Although I am resentful of how little they pay to use my money, I like the new banking ways better. At least now I don't have to listen to someone pr etend that they give a crap about me or my company when I have to use bank services. They do as little as possible now and make no pretense about it.

Robert

Reply to
nailshooter41

My sentiments exactly!

IME (and I do recall a time when this was not the case) it has been at least 30 years since having a long term relationship with "your" banker was in any way, shape or form, beneficial, or even possible, to a small business.

Reply to
Swingman

On 11/8/2013 12:14 PM, Swingman wrote: ...

Sorry to hear it...it's still _the_ way here. You've apparently lost much if not mandatory in doing business at least in a personal life experience/enrichment process of being able to do business in the old-timey handshake fashion. Not all progress is really progress.

I've not (by choice) lived in a truly major metro area but have been in areas w/ 1M+ in greater business area. Even there there were small but nationally-chartered banks with which one could have such a relationship.

Here there's no pretense whatsoever--they _ARE_ interested and they _ARE_ beneficial and it's worthwhile to keep in touch even though I've known the president (and major stockholder) since we were kids...we're neighbors as well as business partners and friends. His family also owns ground we've farmed since within a year or two of my grandfathers' having homesteaded the place (one year away from "century farm" status this year).

Reply to
dpb

On 11/8/2013 1:19 PM, dpb wrote: ...

While there is a lot more paperwork than in olden days owing to Dodd-Frank and all the other crap been put on the banks, one prime advantage of the personal relationship is that dealing with it is essentially pro forma after the fact or just replicate and date to satisfy the files instead of having to "do it all again"...

Reply to
dpb

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