After hearing all the hoopla and yelling and screaming about the salaries of executives at the banks the government bailed out, I’m convinced that the American people believe that those executives should get their ridiculous salaries. They also want the banks to set ridiculously high interest rates and to charge exorbitant late fees and over-your-limit-that-we-just-reduced fees.
How, you ask, do I know this? It’s simple. The American people have not, except for a miniscule minority, stopped paying the banks their usury rates. If the people really cared about the ridiculous salaries and fees, they would have moved their accounts to small local institutions where they are known by their name and not their number.
Really, how hard is it to find a local bank or credit union that would gladly accept your business and actually treat you like a human being? It isn’t hard at all. I personally have accounts at no less than three credit unions and they all treat me like they want my business and think I am important to their success. When I have a problem, a human being will take the time to explain what happened and how to prevent it from happening again. They have even suggested ways I could pay them less in fees by moving some of my money around. Do you think the huge, predator banks would do that? Laugh along with me. Imagine if you got in touch with a human being at one of them and that person gave you that advice. How long would it take the bank to fire that person? I bet it would be about a nano-second.
One of my credit unions has a billboard I pass every day advertizing their standard credit card rate. Would you care to guess what it is? Try 8%. That’s right. They are charging less than one third of what the huge predator banks charge and they are growing like crazy.
There’s something else I get there that I don’t get at the huge predatory banks, service. I mean real, I’m-here-to-help-you, customer service. The type of service that you used to hear your parents talk about. You know, where someone actually welcomes you into the office or means it when they say, “How can I help you today?” How about this one; recently I called to ask about a charge on my account. After we took care of that, the human being on the line asked, “Is there anything else I can do to help you?” Then when I said yes, they took care of that too.
Why in the world would anyone continue to do business with the huge predator banks when they can get customer service like that at a local credit union? The only reason I can think of is that they want the executives of the huge predator banks to get their ridiculous salaries and charge their inflated fees. Or else, the American people are just plain ole lazy. Nope, that couldn’t be it, could it? Are you too lazy to save money and punish the bailout babies?
Tags: bailout, Bank, credit union, economy, fee
