Why I hate PNC Bank
I have a small retirement business. I produce a few hand forged items in my hobby, blacksmithing shop. As part of the business I have a Free Business Checking account (with interest,) at PNC Bank. Each time I receive some frivolous fee on my monthly statement, I have to go back and erase all of the balances on my checkbook balance ledger and recalculate the balance. Because I am frugal and because I do not like wasting my time erasing and recalculating, I try to eliminate all fees.
For instance; the interest on my account was. 05 percent. Not five percent, not one percent, but one-twentieth of one percent. When a typical monthly statement would arrive in the mail it might indicate; your balance is $2,500.00, you have earned eight cents interest for last month. WOW! Needless to say, the eight or twelve cents or whatever, per month, was not worth the time of erasing all of my subsequent balances just to add in the few pennies. After two twenty-two mile Round-trips to the bank, I managed to get the interest (which was actually costing me money,) dropped.
I use carbon copy checks so that I have a permanent record of each transaction. PNC would send an additional copy of each check with my statement-and a $3.00 fee. I called and asked that they stop doing so. They said yes and the service was dropped. The next month the service magically reappeared. This happened three times before it was corrected. Meanwhile the lady I last spoke to regarding the problem offered to stop by my house and introduce herself. That seemed like a rather unconventional solution, and one that definitely did not come to fruition. After the third try, they finally got it right.
No check copying fees, no costly interest; so now I have a Free Checking Account that is actually free right? Wrong. Yesterday I received my monthly account statement. There was an additional fee. Again I had to make a trip to the bank to find out why. I ask one of the tellers what the fee was for? She could not tell by looking at the statement. Off she went to talk with an associate. Back she came with a request for me to wait. Off she went consult a computer. Back she came with no answer. She got on the phone, spewed out some secret code numbers and eventually received an answer. Almost embarrassingly she said, The fee was for depositing over five thousand dollars in your account in one month. She kindly asked if there was anything else she could do for me.
The fee for depositing over $5,000.000 was the straw that broke the camels back. Banks make a fine living using other peoples money. I gave PNC bank over $5,000.00 dollars of my very hard earned money to use interest free for one month. Their method of rewarding me is to charge me a fee for doing so. There is no reasoning they could possibly provide that would legitimize this greed infused fee.
Most businesses are larger than my one-man, part-time operation. Many are depositing more than $5,000.00 per month, and paying the monthly fee.in a sense some are foolishly paying their own interest on their accounts-and then some.
My box of blank checks was getting pretty low a few months ago so I stopped by the bank to order more. When they arrived in the mail they were single checks, not the carbon copy type I have been using at this bank for years. (Was this an attempt to force me to use their paper check-copying service for $ 3.00 per month?) I went back and asked for the carbon copy checks.
They arrived a few weeks later. They had the wrong check numbers printed on them.By this time I was out of checks. I had to use cash only until the third set of checks arrived a few weeks ago. After the third attempt to get correct checks the lady at the bank seemed to adopt somewhat of an accusing attitude like it was my fault the checks were wrong. We are fully into the Computer Age now. If after all these years, PNC and their associate company cannot keep track of the kind of checks I use, and my check numbers, that is deplorable. They must be too busy using all of their computer resources to squeeze every penny that they can out of me by devising more ridiculous service fees?
At this point I must regress. Years ago I used the services of a local bank in my small town of Bonneauville, PA. It was the only bank in town. PNC bought them out. As part of their restructuring, they dropped the Bonneauville branch from their rolls. Despite pleas to keep the branch building open because it was the only banking facility that the older folks had easy access to, they closed the building. It is only business, Mr. Orndorff. I switched to another bank. It is only business Mr. PNC.
After a few years PNC bought out my bank again. As much as I disliked them I figured that I was just stuck with them. I reasoned that they were big and powerful and they would likely buy the next bank I switched to as well.
All of the above described situations cumulatively resulted in considerable waste of my valuable time and money. I could develop a fee structure for that but somehow I dont think PNC would feel that it was fair. The folly of having a business checking account with PNC has caused me to reconsider. The hassle of changing banks is worth my time afterall. I hope to totally wean myself and my wife from the establishment in the future.
On the way home from PNC Bank in Hanover, a bit miffed but determined not to get angry, I spotted a Belco Credit Union building. Thats the ticket, I thought. Before I knew it I was inside the front door-standing in a long line. There was one overworked lady behind the counter. I looked around. A second female was munching away at some goodies at her desk and appeared to be doing nothing else. A lady in another office seemed to be completely hypnotized by the computer screen in front of her. Either that or they sat a mannequin at the chair for effect. I could not really tell because I was heading for the door so fast. My interest in finding ways to save my precious time would not come to fruition here. Belco was clearly not the place to try to achieve such lofty goals.
The above described PNC experiences took place at the Hanover, PA and the New Oxford, PA PNC facilities where it is most convenient for my wife and me to bank.in no way were the behind-the-counter tellers at either bank ever discourteous or unprofessional. They Occupy folks are trying desperately to convince the populace to switch from big banks to Credit Unions for several reasons. I intend to pursue that path.
ADDENDUM 1; My wife just got home from work. I asked her to review this letter. She did so and then she said; thats weird, I just ordered checks from PNC and they sent me the wrong ones too. She noted that she recently upgraded from a Free Checking Account to a Performance Checking Account, because she was told that the upgrade came with free checks. They then charged me $19.00 for the checks. I now get interest on the account she said. We pulled out the last statement. Her rate was not. 05 percent like mine, it was. 01. That is One-hundredth of one percent. She made four cents on her last statement. You can have a couple of thousand dollars in a PNC account and not be able to buy one piece of penny candy with the monthly interest that they pay on their Performance Checking Account. Yep, she had to go back and erase her ledger balances for four cents. She agrees with me-its bye-bye PNC.
To anyone thinking about choosing new bank, I strongly suggest that you heed the above examples before making your choice. 1/14/12
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