The visits to our site continue to rise over time. What do you make of that Chase? Do people like you more or less?
Incidentally, that huge spike in September was Chase’s fiasco of a 72 hour outage.
We had about 100,000 visitors in the last year and about 1.2 million page views.
The number of stories that each visitor reads on average keeps growing too.
Interesting | admin December 23, 2010 | 
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You just can’t make this stuff up!
Chase Bank’s decision to remove a donated Christmas tree from its Southlake branch has generated widespread national attention and threats from customers to pull their accounts from the bank.
More than 2,000 online comments have been posted on the Star-Telegram’s website, an unusually high number for any article, since the newspaper broke the story Dec. 2. Many were angry over what they saw as a war on Christmas.
Chase defended itself, saying only company-issued decorations, including Christmas trees, are allowed in the banks.
After the initial backlash, Chase decided to “apply common sense” and allow the tree’s owner to put the Southlake tree back up at the bank’s expense, said Greg Hassell, a JPMorgan Chase spokesman.
Antonio Morales, the tree’s owner, said he’s not interested and that he would put the tree up at his home or in another bank. He also will bank elsewhere.
Hassell declined to comment on whether customers were leaving the bank.
The donated tree was simply a gift. Morales, owner of Bellagio Day Spa in Southlake, assembled and decorated the 9-foot-tall tree in the lobby of the Chase Bank branch at 1700 E. Southlake Boulevard as a favor to the branch manager, who is one of his clients.
“Southlake is known for its beauty,” Morales said. “I wanted that bank to have a good-looking tree because they didn’t have anything.”
The white tree–covered with LED lights and white and silver ornaments and bows–remained in the lobby from the Monday before Thanksgiving until Nov. 30. Morales said his friend called him the next day telling him to pick up the decorations.
She later showed him an e-mail from JPMorgan Chase saying that the tree had to be removed because it violated company policy.
That policy prohibits customers from making gifts to the bank of any kind, Greg Hassell, a JPMorgan Chase spokesman.
“We appreciate the thoughtful gesture from Mr. Morales,” Hassell said.
Since the story first broke, it has remained the most-read story on the newspaper’s website even days later.
It’s also been picked up by area television stations and major news sites nationwide.
Other Chase banks have Christmas trees in their lobbies, including the location in south Fort Worth on Everman Road, but they are company-issued decorations.
JPMorgan Chase ensures that decorations are “something everyone is comfortable with, regardless of how they celebrate the season,” Hassell said.
“People wish their customers Merry Christmas when it’s appropriate,” he said.
Hassell said that the Southlake branch was supplied with stickers that resemble Christmas lights. Company-supplied decorations vary at other branches, he said.
“Normally they’re small, not intrusive. I’m not sure this [Morales’] Christmas tree was intrusive. That’s not really the issue here. It isn’t a company-supplied decoration.”
Hassell said the policy has been around for a few years, and that decorations change every year.
Morales said he believes Chase removed the tree because it offended customers who don’t celebrate Christmas.
“It wasn’t because it was a gift,” he said.
Other banks are taking advantage of Chase’s bad press.
The Providence Bank of Texas in Southlake, which displays Christmas trees and a nativity scene, has had an influx of new customers who are bailing from Chase, said Randy McCauley, president and chief executive officer.
Providence makes its decisions locally and the directors are Christians who embrace the positive message of the holiday season, McCauley said.
“We unapologetically put Christmas trees and Christmas decorations around our bank,” said Mark Lovvorn, the bank’s chairman.
Bryan Fischer, director of issue analysis for the American Family Association, called Chase’s decision absurd.
The non-profit, conservative Christian group is based in Mississippi. Allen Praytor, a Southlake Chase customer, said he will remain a customer but believes the bank waffled too much whether to leave the tree up or down.
“It’s too inconsistent and it’s emotionally driven,” Praytor said. “I don’t like emotionally based decisions. Are they going to make a decision on a whim?”
Bad bad Chase | admin December 22, 2010 | Comments (1)
We received this story from a reader today:
There is so much to say. We were on a 3 month trail agreement that went to 14 months I was calling, faxing, leaving messages. I always called the Loss Mitigation dept. They said just keep on making ur payments ok this past Aug 2010 We did a phone financial & I did fax all the infor. the same day too. Just keep on making ur payments if we need any thing we will call u. So I went into chase to make our Dec. 1 2010 modification payment they would not take it 🙁 it is SUSPENDED in FORECLOSURE!!!! What? I ask chase to call for me!! They told me that. WHAT the HELL chase did not call me fax me email fed ex me nothing. I was told Mr. Vahe said that Laurel Lindsey got my case after 14 months on this trial modification we were paying on time calling all the time, where is our permanent workout solution for our loan cause the trial has been completed + ? O This Laurel Lindsey only had our case for 5 DAYS, now there saying we have been 19 months past due What? we were on a mod. & b for that we had to FILE BANKRUPTCY for a modification we had to much debt. I will be back…… Please help me help
Oh Chase, how long can you hope to continue to get away with such a twisted loan modification process before Congress slams you with new regulations?
Long story short, 19 months ago I filed for a loan modification after I lost my job. Chase has lied to me, missed countless deadlines, lost fax after fax with bank account and social security numbers, not returned phone calls and their credit dept. has harrassed the living shit out of me. I have written letters to the NYS Attorney General, Comptroller of Currency, local newspaper complaining of the unethical way which Chase has conducted their business. A few weeks ago they tell me I am approved and foolishly, I get excited about what should be good news after all of this BS.
Incredibly, they make an offer to me that is $83.00 more per month than when I started this fiasco. My pay has been reduced by almost $25k and somehow Chase offers me a higher mortgage to “help me out”.
And the icing on the cake is that they gave me a “temporary” loan mod over a year ago until this was settled. The money I was saving during this period ($650/mo.) was reported as a shortfall by Chase and reported to the credit agencies as such. They single-handedly dropped my credit rating by over 150 points so it is almost impossible to explore any other options.
CHASE HOME MORTGAGE SUCKS!!!!!!!!
I guess this customer should be lucky that Chase didn’t demand all the savings during the loan modification period in a lump sum like they have done with plenty other customers and foreclose if the customer didn’t pay.
Bad bad Chase, Loan modification | admin December 21, 2010 | Comments (1)
A reader just sent this story to us. Each time I hear a story like this I just keep thinking “aren’t banks supposed to be good at this stuff?” I guess Chase doesn’t consider this to be a core competency.
My branch that I’ve banked at for over 3 1/2 years broke two federal regulations on foreign checks that I deposited. The assistant manager admitted that this was a “colossal failure” on the branch’s part. The VP of the branch was extremely mean to me and my wife and suggested that if I didn’t like Chase’s policies I should leave the bank. He was even dumb enough to put this in writing. For the record, I’m a university professor with a PhD and older than this branch manager.
The VP of the branch also said that my wife and I should be more understanding with his branch even though they broke two federal regulations. As he put it, “It’s not every day that we deal with foreign checks so you can’t expect us to get it right every time!” (I’ve got this saved on a voice mail).
Because of my branch’s “colossal failure” my deposit of a Canadian check is now being sent to collections where it could remain for six weeks. After that, the funds will be returned to my account and I will be charged a $45 dollar fee for their mistake.
I talked to a competitor about this process and they said, “It should only take one week!”
For the record, the assistant manager told me and my wife that had the transaction been done correctly and the right paperwork been filed we would’ve received the funds in one week without a fee.
My last phone call with the VP ended with him saying, “I don’t want to discuss this anymore with you! Don’t call me again!”
Unbelievable!
Things are getting more difficult in the foreclosure arena and today’s announcement by the New Jersey Supreme Court isn’t helping Banks. The Court has basically demanded that the banks prove their foreclosure process and documentation is correct and will not result in incorrect foreclosures.
Ouch! for the banks, good for the rest of us.
Foreclosure | admin December 20, 2010 | Comments (1)
WASHINGTON — US regulators subpoenaed JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp., Goldman Sachs Group, and Wells Fargo & Co., seeking information on the banks’ role in bundling mortgages for sale to investors, a person familiar with the matter said.
The Securities and Exchange Commission asked the banks for details on how mortgages were selected and bundled into securities, said the person, who declined to be identified because the probe isn’t public. Reuters reported the SEC probe yesterday.
The SEC, which is investigating business practices that might have contributed to the collapse of the subprime mortgage market, has sued companies and executives responsible for selling loan bundles that soured when the housing bubble burst.
Bad bad Chase, Lawsuits | admin December 18, 2010 | Comments (0)
A former employee embroiled in a wrongful termination suit against Chase has filed a whistle-blower suit with the SEC. Either she is trying to bully them into settling her case, or Chase went ahead and fired someone who knew where the bones were buried, in which case, note to Chase, when someone knows all the stuff you’ve done that is illegal, you might want to keep them on the payroll.
1. Chase Bank sold to third party debt buyers hundreds of millions of dollars worth of credit card accounts. . .when in fact Chase Bank executives knew that many of those accounts had incorrect and overstated balances.
3. Chase Bank executives routinely destroyed information and communications from consumers rather than incorporate that information into the consumer’s credit card file, including bankruptcy notices, powers of attorney, notice of cancellation of auto-pay, proof of payments and letters from debt settlement companies.
4. Chase Bank executives mass-executed thousands of affidavits in support of Chase Banks collection efforts and those Chase Bank executives did not have personal knowledge of the facts set forth in the affidavits.
5. When senior Chase Bank executives were made aware of these systemic problems, senior Chase Bank executives — rather than remedy the problems — immediately fired the whistleblower and attempted to cover up these problems.When I reached Almonte’s lawyer, George Pressly, for comment, he was shocked that I had the letter because it was supposed to be confidential. While Pressly was willing to confirm Almonte was a client, beyond that he had no comment. Pressly, who was clearly trying to figure out how to handle the letter’s disclosure, said he was suddenly getting a “firestorm” of calls and seemed unprepared for the onslaught. While he has filed many SEC complaints before — he operates the website http://www.secwhistleblowerprogram.org/, which is how Almonte found him — her letter is the first one he’s filed that went public.
If this suit is successful, homeowners fighting foreclosure will have lots of ammunition to contest their own foreclosures.
