1st off let me just say, Bank of the West is not only a horrible company to work for, but they are a horrible company to have an account with. Before I get to my main complaint, let me fill you in on a day of working with the company. There are on a "hiring freeze, " or at least that is what they tell us. So, don't call in sick, or think about taking a vacation, they are SO understaffed that it makes it horrible on the ones that show up everyday and do their job. Having to work 6 days out of the week for 3 of the 4 weeks in a month is unheard of in the banking world. Thats why most people work at a bank, to get weekends off, but no, not Bank of the West employees. So, basically, we are over worked, and we are NOT allowed any overtime pay.
My annual raise was combined with my promotion raise and it was a whopping total of 00.81 cents. 00.81 cents should have been my annual raise, and then another for becoming a manager... What a waste of raise. Plus we never got our 2 15 minute breaks that every full time, 8 hr work day, employee is supposed to get. So - heres what happened.
I am an ex-employee of Bank of the West, I was the Assistant Customer Service Manager. My last day was 05/18/07. My employee checking account was then changed to a Free Checking, for I was just a normal customer now. My boyfriend was on the account as well. He is the one that primarily uses the account for his childs' day care and child support. Which, by the way, ALL of the employees at that particular branch (Penn Plaza) knew that. I worked there for almost 2 years, they knew everything about the fact that the account was for those purposes.
An FYI: Every account at Bank of the West has, what they call, an "overdraft matrix." It is simply a matrix that the systems uses without the customers knowledge. It will allow items to be paid even if there is insufficient funds.
So, my account had be negative roughly 30 or some dollars, which I was aware of, but I knew that I had a $250.00 overdraft matrix (again the customer never knows this, but I worked there, so I knew), so I knew that I would just have to pay a overdraft fee. Well, my boyfriend, wrote a check for 130.00 to his daycare on May 28, fully aware that the account was negative. The matrix would have paid the check and just added an overdraft fee. He was to be paid from his work on 06/08, which he was going to replenish our account. So, he wrote the check knowing that it would draw the account even more negative, and that he would receive another fee. So on Friday, 06/08/07, my boyfriend deposited 300.00 and I deposited 90.00 on 06/09/07, which covered what we were negative and then some. Well, my boyfriend gets a call from his day care on 06/11/07 saying his check was returned. Well, clearly it confused me because on the banks ETime Banker (where I can review my account) it showed that the check for 130.00 cleared on 06/01. So I told my boyfriend that his daycare has to be mistaken, it cleared and the funds were taken, and there was nothing returned, via the online banking. So I call Penn Plaza (again I used to work there, I know how things run), and I speak with Michelle Whittington, the Customer Service Manager, she tells me that they did return the check. I ask how, since it shows that it cleared on 06/01/07. She tells me that it did clear, but then they reversed it and returned it on 06/04/07 because, and get this, because I was no longer employeed there and they were worried that I would not repay the account.
Okay, so had a been a "regular" customer, this is how this situation would have taken place. The check would have been paid, per the overdraft matrix, and there would have been an overdraft fee. Then I would have had 45 days to make my account positive again or it would have been charged off.
However, that did not happen. The check did clear, and a fee was given, but then, on the next business day, the branch manager Katie John gave the authority to reverse the transaction and return the item. So, although my boyfriend still needed to pay someone the 130.00, he now has a fee from our account and has to pay his daycare persons fee as well. For these managers to make it their personal action to contact someone on the next business day, after the transaction was completed and a done deal, is discrimination. This would have NEVER been done to a normal customer. They now have slandered my boyfriends personal character by making his seem like he can't pay his daycare and has to write hot checks. Then they have discriminated me because they did not treat me like a regular customer. They may be holding some type of grudge against me for resigning, I do not know. Nonetheless, it is WRONG! I have already discussed the matter with 2 other branch manager within the company and they both are in agreement with me and what they did was wrong, and that it was poor business. I will be going to the branch tomorrow to request that I get my fee reversed, and that they compensate me for having to pay the daycares fee as well. Also, I will request that Katie write a letter of apology to my boyfriends day care for making this an unnecessary inconvienence.
Stay away from working for this company and / or being their customer.
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