A Different Wells Fargo
* I was amused to read the pie-in-the-sky depiction of Wells Fargo & Co. that Dick Kovacevich paints in his interview [“Wells Fargo’s CEO Wants It All: Your Business, That Is,” Oct. 15].
I have for years maintained my personal accounts at Wells Fargo and my business accounts at Bank of America and have observed a dramatically declining quality of service at both banks after their recent acquisitions by out-of-state (and out-of-touch) mega-banks.
Kovacevich envisions a banking environment where all the pieces work together to create a harmonious whole, which will in turn entice customers to bring all of their financial business to the bank. He obviously hasn’t left the executive suite much, because my recent experience with the new Wells Fargo has been that it is fractured and divided.
Different parts of the newly cobbled-together enterprise not only don’t have a common focus or means of communicating with one another, but they also don’t even share the same sets of policies and procedures.
For example, when Norwest Corp. bought Wells Fargo, I was told by a branch employee that the merger would be a great benefit to me because now a direct withdrawal from my Wells Fargo checking account of the monthly payment on my Norwest home loan would qualify my checking account for a waived service charge. Because, at $8 per month, Wells Fargo’s checking charges are among the highest in the industry, I eagerly signed up for the new program.
Since that time, my account has been charged the regular $8 service fee consistently. I have visited my branch or called the telephone banking system no less than five times in an attempt to resolve this error, and each time (after having to assure themselves by checking with supervisors that that is indeed the bank’s new policy, because the rank-and-file employees apparently aren’t trained in the new bank’s policies and procedures) the charge has been reversed and I have been assured that my account has been placed on “fee waiver status.”
Nonetheless, the following month the fee is again assessed, and I find myself once again having to explain the bank’s own policies to yet another bank employee, who goes through the same motions but with no permanent resolution to the problem.
Most recently, I spoke with a telephone banker who had never heard of such a policy, but when he verified that it was in fact the bank’s policy, he reversed the most recent service charge.
He then offered to call my local branch to have the manager place my account on waiver status (because apparently only local branch managers have the authority to do so, which is the first I’d heard of that new policy). When he called, the branch manager was out to lunch.
The teller who answered the phone call refused to take a message to have the branch manager call me back, and he told his co-worker that it was the branch manager’s policy that I would have to call and make an appointment with the branch manager personally in order to discuss the issue. I would then have to go down to the branch to have the matter resolved. All this over an $8 charge!
I later received another call on my voice mail from the telephone banker, who had taken the initiative to call the branch back when the manager was there, and they had determined together that my account did not qualify for the fee waiver because I did not have a regular direct deposit into the account. Which, of course, wasn’t the basis for the waiver in the first place--it was due to a regular withdrawal from my account to pay what is now a Wells Fargo mortgage.
The whole thing would be laughable if I had not spent so much time trying to straighten out Wells Fargo employees about Wells Fargo’s own checking policies. The straw that broke the camel’s back was the arrogance of the branch personnel, who assumed that they could retain a long-term customer by refusing to take messages and demanding my physical presence to correct their own mistake.
Kovacevich is absolutely correct when he states that “the banking industry is dead and should be buried.” His own bank is a vivid example of the truth of that statement.
Horrible customer service, arrogance and inconsistent employee training are what will cause his bank’s demise. It’s a shame, because before its acquisition by Norwest, Wells Fargo had always been a pleasure to deal with.
RAYMOND H. SIMMONS
Newport Beach
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* Interesting discussion with Wells Fargo’s CEO. I wish I could have asked him what is wrong with this picture: My Wells Fargo savings account pays 1%, inflation is about 2%, and I pay 15% income tax on savings. Any wonder why savings are down?
KURT SIPOLSKI
Palm Desert
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* The interview with the CEO of Wells Fargo Bank was an exercise in financial arrogance. Mr. Kovacevich is quite correct in predicting the demise of the “traditional” bank; that is a product of intention! Personal banking services are no longer available, and customers can only look forward to being the target of additional fees and no service.
I have been a depositor at Wells Fargo for the past 16 years, only to see the service disappear, as well as employees treating me as a “number” and hoping that I will not ask them to cash checks, buy savings bonds or use any of the other “services” the bank claims to provide.
If Mr. Kovacevich thinks he can have it all--that is, the business that he expects the customer to want outside the “traditional” banking needs, he is sadly mistaken.
I would suggest that a potential customer first look to see how an institution handles its “regular” business. Seeing how the core “business” is being treated by the banking industry would hardly provide any incentive to get into other areas that the banks are even less familiar with.
Despite the fact that I have had a “relationship” with Wells Fargo for these last years, it is the last place I would buy stocks and bonds, house insurance or anything else Mr. Kovacevich thinks his bank could handle.
Unhappily, I do not find any solace in going to any of the other banking behemoths, because I think the same philosophy is in place! Good luck to any “investors”--and caveat emptor!
WILLIAM J. GLICK
Los Angeles
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