USA, Canada /
National City Bank complaint. Polish-client experience. [20]
If you are a Polish person who lives in the US (especially in Chicago area), here is some piece of advice to you that you will thank me for.
If you had an account with MidAmerica Bank you should now be aware the bank was bought by National City bank (nationalcity.com). Now they try to act as if they are the same bank and offer the same quality service.
MAKE NO MISTAKE - the people from the National City Bank are morons and if you value your money do not ever deal with the morons! Here is what happened:
I sent a relative who lives in another state a check over a week ago (close to 10 days now). He has not received it yet so he contacted me. We concluded someone could have stolen the mail so I decided to call National City bank to find out if maybe the check was cashed or what is going on with it. I was afraid someone could be trying to cash the check and commit fraudulent transaction. So I called their customer service number as listed on their website: (888) 622-4932. I got connected with a representative. She asked me about my name and my social security number. It went smoothly. But then she wanted to know my phone number on the account. Since I opened this account a few years ago, the phone number in their file was probably old. But I still remembered it and provided. She said - sorry, but the number is wrong. Then I said, not possible, but here are two other numbers. She claimed they were wrong again, even though it was impossible since in my life in Chicago area I only used these three phone numbers. Then she asked me about the branch I opened my account with. I told her that it was on Milwaukee Avenue in Chicago. I don't know why she asked me that because she sighed like an idiot and moved on to the next question which was "Can you tell me last deposits you made on this account"? I told her it's hard to remember, but I have it in my papers. So I checked my papers and told her "OK, I have my last statement from Oct 1 to Oct 31 - which day do you need?" She replied that "sorry, but we don't have such an OLD information in our system. I will need your three most recent transactions."
I told her "What? Today is December 5 and I only receive your monthly statement, you haven't sent me the statement from November yet. Is for your system 30+ days too old?" She shrugged and didn't know what to say. Banking system that only keeps information for 30 days is good for kids, maybe.
I need to mention I talked to two different customer service people. After my first call I took my time to gather all information I had and called again. With the second person there was the same story - they cannot find any information from the former bank. And they won't help me with that - even if I told them I strongly suspect banking fraud. But they don't care, they prefer to follow their stupid agenda even though they have no actual information they could verify it!
All in all, it appears that the transfer from MidAmerica bank to National City bank was a total failure. From what I can tell they did not manage to transfer any information other than the account number. If you are a former MidAmerica bank customer, I suggest you to run away and open a new account in a serious bank. If you have a problem like I did, all your social security numbers, phone numbers, former addresses, maiden names, etc. are for NOTHING because they failed to put it in their system! You are like a man who wants to get a social security benefit without an ability to prove you actually have a social security number!
One more thing - this is a joke like they try to get POLISH clients and they don't even have a Polish customer service people! All they have is an interpreter (you have to wait for her a few minutes to show up) and then when you talk in Polish she would translate it into English. I imagine they only have one Polish interpreter per location so you can bet to wait for a Polish speaking persons for an hour sometimes. In the former MidAmerica bank there were many Polish speaking customer people available. NationalCity is cutting cost and firing Polish people, but they still want Polish people money!
Now I recall how active they are when they advertise on the Polish Radio in Chicago or Polish magazines. They tell you that "National City is your, Polish bank. It's as safe, still "Polish", and as great as never." But they forget to tell you that
"National City's banking system is as screwed up as it can be and you can only bet your luck to have money safe with us. And we fired most of the Polish personnel to have the positions filled with American staff who cannot assist its clients with as simple thing as checking if a check was cashed or not. But we do appreciate your business."And if I mentioned National City's banking fees went up compared to what MidAmerica offered, I would be accused of being too biased.
So, Polonia and Polish people in the USA, let's not give up our rights to a high quality POLISH and NON-MORONIC banking service and try other options than National City Bank. Unless you want to hear a receiver hang-up sound of a National City customer service person who is not willing nor able to help you.
