[GPSCC-chat] End banks deathgrip on your money

[John Thielking]

Well, for what it is worth I went to Meriwest today and successfully opened
a checking account. There were no red flags that they could see in my Chex
Systems report, though the customer service rep said that if my $5k debt on
my defaulted Chase credit card did show up in the Chex Systems report they
would deny me an account. There was a bit of a hassle involved in getting
address verification that would satisfy Meriwest management who had to
approve the account application. They really wanted a utility bill or a
lease agreement that showed where I live. My room mate pays the space rent
and utilities and there is no written agreement between us, though there is
a formal application for park residency on file with the mobile home park
management. The customer service rep said the park agreement would not be
sufficient. So I asked them if I could use my Social Security benefit tax
statement and/or a statement of account activity from my Medicare Advantage
program provider. I came back an hour later with those documents along with
what was left of the notice from when I got my new credit card. When I did
that, they approved the account straight away, despite an earlier
conversation that indicated that it might take up to one week for
management to approve the application.  All of this means that anyone who
receives their mail at a PO Box and doesn't pay their utility bill
themselves or have a written rental agreement with their landlord can't get
an account there.  Well Drew was partly right at least. I at least, as a
test case, was able to get an account there, despite my poor credit history.

Now for a preliminary analysis of the real goal I had in mind which was to
find a credit union that has "inherently secure" online credit unioning of
some form or another available:

It took a bit of convincing and a call by the customer service rep to
management on the phone before she could confirm that indeed there is a
feature on the web site that allows people with accounts to log into just
the e-statement feature separately from the online banking log in.  The
e-statements are only updated once per month. I told the rep that I would
like to see a system developed where the e-statements are updated daily.

Earlier today, I attempted to find out if there were any other credit
unions or banks that had a separate log in for e-statements. Bank Of The
West has separate log ins available for a bunch of features, but not for
e-statements. Nobody else has anything like this feature available at
Meriwest at all.

Later when I attempted to access the e-statement feature online, I was
unable to create a log in just yet as apparently the online portion of the
system doesn't recognize my account information just yet. I looked at the
online registration for both the e-statement log in creation and the online
banking log in creation. There are fewer questions to answer on the
e-statement log in than there are on the online banking log in.  I'm hoping
that after I create the e-statement log in I will still be unable to create
a valid online banking log in as I told the rep repeatedly that I wanted
online banking disabled. I also set up the account to have telephone
banking disabled. I'm not sure how to test out spoofing that to see if it
is really disabled, so I will probably leave that one alone. I asked if
there was any way for them to disable online money transfer and bill pay
for valid online accounts. There is no such feature yet. There also is not
yet a two factor security system in place for online money transfer and
online bill pay. Direct Express debit card accounts have this feature.
Also, Meriwest does not allow cash advances at their teller window for
debit cards that have the Master Card logo, so people getting their Social
Security payments on their Direct Express cards have to change over to
direct deposit to their Meriwest accounts or use the money to bank account
feature within the Direct Express log in to transfer large sums from Social
Security to their Meriwest accounts. The ATM outside the branch is supposed
to work with MC, according to the rep, though I didn't see a MC logo on the
ATM. Transferring money that way is expensive as it will cost $3 every time
you make an ATM withdrawl from a Direct Express card.  Another beef I have
with Meriwest is that I have yet to determine if various account activity
alerts advertised at their online account log in page are available if you
don't sign up for online account access. Chase alerts me to a low balance
by e-mail even though I don't online bank with them. Meriwest's PIN
generation tool that is used when you sign up for a debit card is secure
and all done over the phone, not online. There is no minimum balance to
avoid service charges on the Meriwest checking account as long as the
account is used periodically. If you anticipate leaving it idle for long
periods and don't want to be charged $3 per month service fees, just keep a
minimum balance of $100.  They didn't discuss other miscellaneous fees when
I signed up, but later I noticed when reading their CU network card that
has my account number on it that there are various fees charged such as
$0.17 per check for more than 11 checks deposited and a $5 "check
withdrawl" fee per check withdrawl and so on. When I signed up for the
account, I was able to add features that make Point Of Sale terminal
transactions and ATM withdrawls that use the PIN # get declined if there
are not enough funds in the account, but all other types of overdrafts will
still go through, with a $35 overdraft fee attached.   I'll let you know if
I find out more.

Sincerely,

John Thielking


On Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 10:25 AM, Drew <rainbeaufriend at riseup.net> wrote:

> No I'm not "insulted", just concerned that collectively we move our money
> out of the banks into credit unions.
> Truly banks are fueling the destruction of the planet.
>
> Green is local!
>
>
> Drew
>
>
> --
> Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.
>
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