Weird, so I have never worked for a bank in my life. I like to know things about places that I bank, and any other important things in my life. I read paperwork. And I have a good memory. I also tend to stand up for things when I believe they are being unfairly attacked. I have banked at Wamu since I was twelve. I also bank at Wells Fargo, and I now have an Ally account (as I mentioned previously about doing research on online accounts).

I could also tell you lots of things about my mattress (which doesn’t have money stuffed in it). And though I may think I have the best mattress, and be able to spout off fancy things about it (and I can) that doesn’t make me a mattress salesperson.

I have no idea what “drank the Kool-Aid” means. So if that’s a Chase-employee inside-joke from when YOU worked at Chase, then obviously I’m not going to get it.

seriously, this is why i don’t bank at Chase. It’s because of employees like you who are so brainwashed that you will spend all this time on a site like this to defend your horrible company.

I’ve worked at Chase. I know the culture, half the people are their
for a paycheck, the other half “drank the Kool-Aid” ….. like you obviously did.

But if by chance Wamu customers are entitled to terms that are unchanging with customer consent, and you have a copy somewhere of the forms you signed, I wish you the best contesting it in court. I’d certainly be interested in learning the outcome.

You need to have a direct deposit of $500, 5 transactions each month, or $1500 in your account. Chase sent a letter out in December stating the new terms as well as if your current account usage would warrant a fee or not. Here is a more in-depth article

http://chicagobreakingbusiness.....itors.html

I didn’t use the account much so I just went to Bank Atlantic (a FL bank) to get a free account with no balance or activity requirements.

Does anyone know if the free personal checking accounts (grandfathered WAMU) will continue to be totally free without hoops to jump through?

I wouldn’t mind keeping the personal account since they have that new Android App for depositing checks.

Credit unions are the best way to go, although as M said, they somtimes have less professional websites, or ATMs, or other inconviences that can “amount” to $10 a month in your time alone.

Another way to go is the all-online banks, like Ally. Some will refund your ATM fees, so you can actually use any ATM, even though you don’t have a physical location to go to. If you are a “tech” person, you may want to at least give that a shot. There are many people who are very happy with that.

Every form of banking is going to have it’s up side and down side. Find the fit for you.

And while the CU I switched to is awesome and I love that they know me by name when I walk in there, their online bill paying is clunky and amateurish compared to the smoothness of a Chase or a Citibank online service. Chase’s ATMs accept your checks without an envelope. As you insert them, they are scanned and the amounts are calculated for you. I’m still jealous of my wife’s ATM deposit experience at her Chase branch vs mine at my CU, where I have to fill out a small novel of information on each deposit envelope.

I was curious about that, so I asked. And a direct deposit has to actually BE a direct deposit to qualify, like a payroll direct deposit. It can’t be a wire transfer, or an external account transfer, or something that isn’t exactly a “direct deposit.”

Sorry, that was a good idea, though.

It must be nice to have a mattress to stick something into it. Maybe i should invest in mattress instead of a bank, wonder what happen if everyone felt the same.

No fees to worry about, no hidden charges, maybe banks should think about that next time they need the people to help them out. maybe there should’t be anymore bail outs, let them fail.

They should think abut that, let the buyer beware or invester beware.

Why don’t you just stick your money under your mattress? If there’s a convenience in having a checking account, instead of the cash under your mattress, then why should you get it for free?

Chase gets nothing from accounts that have very little money in them, or that have constantly changing balances. They can only make money if you keep a significant amount in there constantly. And I guess they’ve decided if they can’t make money off of your money, then they will charge you for having an account with them in the first place.

Good job Chase where with yea,
(Grrr take a long walk off a short……….. )

They are a business, and they run like a business. And like all businesses, they have the right to set their rules, and if customers don’t like it, they don’t have to do business with them.

A bank is not a “service,” it is a business. And businesses need to make money. This is true in any economy. But if individual customers are suffering because of unemployment and all that, then the bank is also vulnerable. Chase is trying to weed out the customers that are “bad business.” You know who I’m talking about: The countless overdrafts, and then they argue about paying their overdraft fees; The accounts that only have a few dollars in them at any given time, giving Chase nothing to work with; The customers who have several accounts, but don’t really use them, etc. What kind of monetary value do those accounts have to Chase? What kind of time gets wasted by the bankers (paid hourly) sorting out problem accounts? A nice bank would be more than happy to do it for you, and take the loss, just to have a happy customer who never has more than $100 in their account even on their best months. Chase is not in it for the friends they are making, they are in it for the money they are making.

But that’s the same as most other businesses. I have never had someone at Starbucks give me free coffee just because I had lost my job.

For me, my checking account will be free because I have a direct deposit of over $500.00. I don’t make a lot of money, and I don’t have a lot sitting in my accounts. But I have a steady job that pays me a steady wage (in the “traditional” form of biweekly checks, rather than, say, getting paid in cash every week), and that’s the kind of customer Chase wants. If they aren’t going to make money off of someone, at the very least they don’t want to waste time dealing with their poor budget management.

I’m not a big fan of all the changes. (I had a dream the other night that Chase was converting everyone from round wheels to square wheels…haha.) I just don’t think Chase owes anyone (well, most of us) anything. We are not “entitled” to receive free checking, free notary services, free health care, or what-have-you. And expecting that out of a bank, simply because it “used” to be that way is unreasonable. It used to be that we didn’t have to lock our doors when we stepped away from the house for the day. It used to be that we could go through airport metal detectors and that was enough.

If you don’t like it, don’t lock your doors, don’t travel in airplanes, and don’t bank with Chase. That’s always your prerogative.

After the bailouts and them still granting their CEO’s big bonuses we have to pay $10 a month if we don’t meet their ridiculous requirements! And I say ridiculous because just look at the economy! The unemployment rate isn’t dropping and yet they want us to have $1500 daily minimum balance, at least one direct deposit of $500 or more monthly, an average balance of $5000 or more in a combination of deposit accounts with them or investment accounts, or pay $25 or more in qualifying account fees. Right now how many people are going to be able to meet one of those in order to avoid getting charged $10 every month?

We went ahead and signed and sent back the affidavit and they issued us provisional credit for the amount of $542. All was fine and dandy.

During the first week of May 2010 we noticed that $542 was deducted from our Chase account. Thinking it was fraud again, I contacted Chase. I was told we had a remaining balance with WAMU and that Chase is collecting this amount. I was telling the rep that I did not receive any mail, phone call or email notifying me of this. She simply said, ” We do not need to notify you.”

They were stating that the claim I made in 2009 was denied. I asked her why and she couldn’t tell me any information about it. They found the claim, but they can’t figure out why it was denied. I’ve been going back and forth with the telephone bankers, getting pushed off to different people. Get this, after 1 month of numerous calls, they tell me that they can’t find the claim. The claim just vanished into thin air.

The telephone bankers tell me to go to the branch when I initially opened my account. Instead I called the branch ( it’s 45 minutes away) to ask if they can help assist me in this matter. No, they couldn’t. Instead I went to my local bank and talked to one of the managers.

They helped me with trying to figure out more of what happened to the claim. After 1 hour, this is the result.

The claim was made in 8/2009 with WAMU. Since Chase took over they wiped the system clean of all WAMU history. They no longer have my claims or anything to go off. CAN THEY DO THIS??? I am going to keep on fighting this battle. I am not going to pay for a criminal’s wrongdoing. $542!! I have a family of 4 to support, that is a lot of money to be taken right out from under my nose with no detailed information of why the claim was denied.

I feel I am entitled to an explanation as to why the money was taken from me. Obviously we called and reported the fraud and sent in the affidavit. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have issued the provisional credit. Now they’re taking back the money stating that the claim was denied. Where is the paperwork, where is the proof of our claim being denied??

I read in a post that all WAMU accounts will be transferred to Chase in October, I believe. I assume this would include WAMU’s history as well.

Can someone please lend some advice, I’m all ears.

And I am leaving chase for good. Local credit union here I come..