Fun With Banks - The Podcast

"SteveLehto" (stevelehto) 06/09/2016 at 09:00 • Filed to: None

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Ever had a problem with a bank that got resolved in your favor? Most of the time, bank errors go against the consumer. And trying to battle the banks is nigh unto impossible. But, I have a few good stories of times I - or my clients - got the better of them. It’s this week’s podcast.

The banking industry has one of the worst reputations for customer service. Fees climb while service quality slips. Have a problem with your account? Phone the call center in Asia and realize you will get nowhere before you’ve made it through the phone-maze. “For English, press the Ampersand Key.” Wait, what?

So, I’ve got a few stories of times I dealt with banks and had good results. I’ll admit, it’s only happened a few times in 24 years of law practice. And a couple of these were for me. In other words, when most people have problems with their banks, attorneys won’t get involved. Regulations are a nightmare and everyone knows: You cannot win.

At least, most of the time. These stories are memorable because they have happy endings. The very very rare happy endings.

The audio:

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And the video:

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Steve Lehto has been practicing law for 24 years, almost exclusively in consumer protection and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! He wrote !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

This website may supply general information about the law but it is for informational purposes only. This does not create an attorney-client relationship and is not meant to constitute legal advice, so the good news is we’re not billing you by the hour for reading this. The bad news is that you shouldn’t act upon any of the information without consulting a qualified professional attorney who will, probably, bill you by the hour.

ED9man2 > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:14

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I wish you still did text transcriptions!

SteveLehto > ED9man2 06/09/2016 at 09:15

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That implies I’ve done them in the past. But since I wing these without a script, a transcript would take a while for me to write.

Shadowman > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:18

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Well, this one time they screwed up and I got an extra $200 a few spaces before payday.

SteveLehto > Shadowman 06/09/2016 at 09:20

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I bet you blew it all on a drunken stay at Boardwalk.

Shadowman > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:22

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BTW Steve, Just discovered your podcast a few weeks ago and I binge-listened to it a bit while I was in the process of buying a used car. Love it!

SteveLehto > Shadowman 06/09/2016 at 09:23

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Thanks! They are starting to pile up now so it would take quite a while to listen to them all.

Paullubbock > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:40

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I have a love-hate relationship with my bank so I understand. If you ever watch Big Bang Theory your title reminded me of Fun with Flags with Sheldon Cooper.

FN-2187 > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:40

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I haven’t been able to access my bank account since I was 18 (24 now) because I don’t have ID, I was trying to put money into my bank so I could get a new passport.

SteveLehto > Paullubbock 06/09/2016 at 09:41

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Yes, “Fun With Flags” rocks!

Junker_CM > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:43

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I’m glad Navy Fed has been great to me.

FartyMcCloud > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 09:49

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Bank lawyer here. Always nervous when tellers start explaining the law to customers.

(Side note: she was thinking of UCC 4-404 - bank not obligated to pay check more than six months old. Obviously not obligated  illegal!)

btw - anyway I can get out of the greys?

SteveLehto > FartyMcCloud 06/09/2016 at 09:56

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Thanks for the note. Someone else pointed this out in the video comment section. (It had been a while since I looked the rules up.) But you are right. They don’t HAVE to. But they CAN.

Wil Haginen > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 10:07

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Not a story involving money, but I do have one involving a bank. I have a very distinctly foreign name. Far more foreign than my handle, but we’ll pretend it’s “Wil Haginen” for now.

I walked into a large bank (rhymes with “Base”), and I opened an account with a live person (that is, I didn’t open one through the internet, I had a guy do it just like they used to do before the 90's, except this was in 2009). I hand him my driver’s license to verify ID.

A few days (weeks?) later, I received my first e-statement. It’s addressed to “Haginen Wil”. Upon further investigation, I discover that they had flipped my name around. My last name became my first name, and my first name became my last name. OK, no problem, I’ll just go back to the bank and get it corrected.

Me: “I’d like to get my name corrected, here is my driver’s license.”
Bank: “I see nothing wrong with it, sir.”
Me: “Well could you tell me what your system shows my last name as being?”
Bank: “Your last name shows up as ‘Wil’, and your first name is listed as ‘Haginen’.”
Me: “See, that’s flipped. You can even see right here on the DL that ‘Haginen’ is in the ‘surname’ section.”

(this is the $1 million dollar response)

Bank: “We can’t change the name without verifying your ID, and a DL isn’t sufficient for that.”

I. What? Eventually I got it sorted by bringing in my passport, but seriously, what?

Wil Haginen > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 10:09

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And they had incentive to do so since you had a nice chunk of change sitting in your account that you were threatening to pull. I wish I had that kind of leverage every time I have to deal with bank shenanigans.

SteveLehto > Wil Haginen 06/09/2016 at 10:12

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I’ll admit - that was a fluke. But it worked out for me!

Wil Haginen > ED9man2 06/09/2016 at 10:17

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Summary: Steve gets a personal check, check writer mistakenly writes the previous year on the date section (because this was in January). Bank claims that it’s against the law for them to accept it. Steve does a two-pronged attack and asks bank to provide proof of law AND that if bank wouldn’t deposit the check, he’d pull out his hefty Lawyer-type savings account.

Steve deposits a different check for 1000. Bank credits him 1000, then claims the check was actually written for 100. Steve has proof that bank was wrong. Bank admits fault, then states it’ll take 3 months to correct. Steve plays games on cell phone, and the problem is corrected immediately.

Steve needs ideas for more podcasts, and invites us to pitch ideas to him.

On that bombshell, Steve, how about a podcast on the worst injustices you’ve come across, that you took upon yourself to fight?

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 10:25

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I once had a bank error in my favour and collected $200.

ETA: Dammit, someone already beat me to that joke.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > Shadowman 06/09/2016 at 10:26

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Beat me.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 10:28

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The odds of a $200 stay at the boardwalk are pretty slim.

sklooner > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 06/09/2016 at 10:38

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You can sleep under the one in Atlantic city fot that amount

Hirsch > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 10:42

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PNC Bank. One week they decided to hold my paycheck, resulting in a bunch of overdraft fee’s that was literally my entire paycheck. We called to complain and got nowhere. So we went to our branch and talked with the manager. She claimed that they held my check because it was my check going into my wifes account and they wanted to make sure it was legitimate. We rightfully called bullshit on that and told them to bring up our account. The account showed my paycheck, the same amount every week, being deposited into the same account for over a year. They relented and refunded every overdraft fee.

We had the same issue with 5/3 Bank. A few years ago I got a check in the mail, my share of the class-action lawsuit filed against 5/3. About a month later, we got another check from PNC for the same reason. Both banks had programs that would look for accounts like mine, then they would hold deposits and let a bunch of debits go through, then rape you with overdraft fees. It was deliberate and they even though they denied it, both banks settled the law suits rather than go to court.

the7thearlofgrey > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 10:43

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just try to have fun with these guys and live to tell about it

Mark Longoria > Junker_CM 06/09/2016 at 10:43

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Because it’s a Credit Union not a Bank .

Wil Haginen > the7thearlofgrey 06/09/2016 at 10:59

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What’s the story here?

the7thearlofgrey > Wil Haginen 06/09/2016 at 11:03

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they are the ultimate global central bank basically controlling the world economy

Duke of Kent > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 11:05

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I switched banks when I moved, and at the time I was unwilling to pay the few dollars for the electronic transfer fee that my old bank wanted to charge me, so I had them cut me a cashier’s check, which I intended to take to my new bank to deposit. An error somewhere in the deposit process caused the decimal point to be dropped. Imagine my surprise when I checked my balance and found it to be two orders of magnitude greater than I expected! I pointed out the error (I knew that they'd find it quickly), and they corrected it the next day. I think I still have the ATM receipt with the erroneous amount, though.

That was some fun with banks.

Wil Haginen > the7thearlofgrey 06/09/2016 at 11:11

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So are they hiring???

the7thearlofgrey > Wil Haginen 06/09/2016 at 11:18

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only if you know any of these people

Junker_CM > Mark Longoria 06/09/2016 at 11:18

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I know. Makes me question why everyone doesn’t use them.

toecutter (so grey, I gotta wear shades) > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 11:32

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When I paid off my mortgage a number of years ago, the bank somehow listed it as closed/deceased. I didn’t know this (and I wasn’t even dead) until I tried to get credit (just to do it) for a $400 computer. The application was denied and a few days later I received a letter from the finance company telling me I was deceased. Imagine my surprise. I ran a credit check on myself and discovered who had listed me as deceased and called the bank and told them, "but I'm not dead" (cue Monty Python), "you need to fix this", they actually found their mistake, corrected it and sent me a letter confirming it. The only thing left was to go to the three credit reporting services, dispute the erroneous report (I waited about a month to allow the bank to get it's records straight), within a short time all was good. As far as the computer that I wanted, I just wrote a check, I didn't really need the credit. After reading and hearing about all the horror stories about having to deal with this kind of thing, it really went pretty smooth. It was straightened out inside of six months. Maybe that's a long time, I don't know, but I didn't let it eat me up and in the long run it got sorted out. I still have a good relationship with the bank and I have excellent credit.

OBI > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 12:34

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Lloyds Bank in the house, bad news.

Gads > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 13:15

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Reminds me of a time I had to deal with a bank that rhymes with Hells Margo. My elderly, Alzheimer’s stricken got scammed by a phone salesman out of $399 for a ID theft protection kit. He (my dad) gave out a check number, and bank routing number and the thieves wrote themselves an e-check. I caught it and took it to the bank (that rhymes with Hells Margo) to put a stop on the check. They said they couldn’t do it because our dad gave it out voluntarily. We caved and told them to freeze the account and warned them that this company was crooked. Fast forward a few months and the scammers hit my dad’s account TWO MORE TIMES - each for $399. I went back into the branch and asked to speak with the manager. We told him how we had alerted the bank to the thievery months ago and asked how they let it happen not once, but twice more. Their answer - we failed to follow up with our complaint in writing. They said it was bank policy. I then asked them to please close all of my dad’s existing accounts (over $50K) that I would be opening up new accounts across the street at the competing bank. Suddenly the manager found a way to credit our account back the almost $800 that disappeared. I thanked him for his help and left with a smile. One month later, we pulled all of our money and moved it to the next bank anyway.

ajpbradley > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 14:26

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Apropos of nearly-nothing, I walked past the bank branch pictured on Monday morning. It’s at the top of Fleet Street in London, opposite the Royal Courts of Justice.

Ummm... yeah...

StuntmanDan > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 14:42

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I recently ran into a similar issue, and the funny part is that one of a few checks they wouldn’t let me deposit is from the former president of the bank who retired last year. The teller said it’s against the law for them to deposit the check the way it is written, but it’s actually bank policy. I found another workaround, it’s just a complication that is not against the law, just bank policy.

StuntmanDan > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 14:48

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I came across your podcast a few months ago and went through all the old ones over the course of a month or so at work. It can be done!

GreenN_Gold > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 06/09/2016 at 15:53

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With one house, the odds of a $200 stay are quite high. About 100%.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > GreenN_Gold 06/09/2016 at 15:58

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In my games, the odds of one house on Boardwalk are nil.

GreenN_Gold > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 16:09

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I once had a billing error in my favor, in the form of a refund, from Comcast of all places! However, that means I don’t know how long they had too much of my money and I don’t have much faith in their billing. Also, I just had to replace a cable box, and the customer service experience was terrible as usual.

Robot: “Welcome to Comcast, please say or enter the first 4 of your billing address.”

Me: Enters numbers.

Robot: “Would you like to take a quick survey at the end of the call?”

Me: “No”

Robot: “I’m sorry. I didn’t get that.”

Me: (Scratching my head, wondering how the robot cannot even understand the word“No”) I repeat my self, “NOOO”

Robot: “OK, please stay on the line at the end of the call to take a brief survey.” Hangs up on me. Line is now dead.

Me: WTF just happened? Calls back. Becomes more infuriated with more BS.

GreenN_Gold > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 06/09/2016 at 16:33

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Gotta start somewhere.

Or end up somewhere as you go broke.

SteveLehto > ajpbradley 06/09/2016 at 16:38

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And you are correct. I took this picture myself. I was walking around just taking pics of cool stuff and today I needed a top shot about a “bank.”

ajpbradley > SteveLehto 06/09/2016 at 16:47

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Excellent! I’ve walked past loads of times and always admired the signs - they’re classy in a way banks just aren’t any more...

SteveLehto > ajpbradley 06/09/2016 at 17:02

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That’s one of my favorite walking stretches in London. There is also a store right along there that sells the wigs and robes for court. I was tempted to buy a set, even though we do not wear them in the US.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > GreenN_Gold 06/09/2016 at 17:05

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Nah, Boardwalk is so expensive to build on there’s no point building until you can put at LEAST 2 houses on it.

Think about it. When you have the set, rent doubles so with $0 invested you get $100 every time someone lands on it. With one house, you get $200, but because you have to build equally it cost you $400 to get there, and for what it’s worth, $200 is peanuts. It’s another matter to spend $2000 and get back $2000 (as you do waiting until you can manage hotels), that’s a game changing amount of Monopoly money.

GreenN_Gold > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 06/09/2016 at 18:19

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In our house, you build equally, but you’re allowed to have an odd number of houses. In other words, you can buy one house for Boardwalk, but the 2nd house you buy must go on Park Place, and so on. So you can spend $200, and collect $200 every time a player lands there.

You can also sell any number of houses, so you may find yourself nearly flat broke with nothing but one house left on Boardwalk.

Umrguy42: Add $5 for shipping and handling > SteveLehto 06/10/2016 at 01:23

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Man, the one time I thought I’d done that (wrote the previous year on a check or something - can’t remember if I actually did or not), I was at the bank and asked, and the teller was all “oh, no, it’s cool, happens all the time, we don’t worry about it during January”.

Umrguy42: Add $5 for shipping and handling > Wil Haginen 06/10/2016 at 01:26

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I have the problem of my last name also being a reasonably common first name, and my first name being common, and a possible last name as well (although usually it would be s, but whatever). Once or twice, although not at a banking level, I’ve had to have that corrected (like with a Sam’s Club membership, kind of deal).

Umrguy42: Add $5 for shipping and handling > Hirsch 06/10/2016 at 01:29

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Just the name “5/3 Bank” bothers me as a pseudo-engineer (ok, Computer Scientist). I’m like, is it a fraction? Is it the fifth 3rd Bank, so it’s really the 7th Bank? WHAT DOES IT MEAN?!

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > GreenN_Gold 06/10/2016 at 08:15

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Yeah, there’s so many different “House rules” (pun intended) in Monopoly it really depends who you’re playing with. That’s actually the really cool thing about it, when you get a bit bored with it you can just mess with the rules. I’ve played where you can have as many hotels on a property as you want, where you can build unevenly with no restrictions, games where the GO value is doubled to account for unlimited hotels, even tried playing with 2 boards joined together.

The only consistencies for me are usually:

- $500 bonus on Free Parking.

- Ditch the “Assessed for street repairs pay x for each house” Chance and Community Chest cards.

- Ditch the $1 bills and round everything.

My usual strategy ends up being buy everything, and if I can’t buy it morgage something to buy it. Once I have one set, morgage everything else and put on as many buildings as possible.

GreenN_Gold > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 06/10/2016 at 11:11

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We only put $75 on Free Parking.

You gotta have the assessment cards to punish the moneybags.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > GreenN_Gold 06/10/2016 at 11:18

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It goes with the style of playing. Our style leaves you right on the ragged edge, so we prefer to set the game up so those spaces are relatively safe zones. Doesn’t matter if you’re moneybags or not, those cards will kill you because you just dropped all your savings into buildings. Actually it takes away the advantage from the moneybags for us by removing those cards, since the moneybags can weather the storm when nobody else can. It’s kind of a leveler so everyone can play as hard as possible.

We actually used to play with credit (sort of, often it was more like loan sharks) just to keep the game going longer, and then playing to a time limit instead of bankrupcy.

GreenN_Gold > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 06/10/2016 at 12:43

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Yeah, we like a slower game with less cash and more decision making. If you’re not moneybags you don’t have any houses and hotels to assess. You may not even have a monopoly yet.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > GreenN_Gold 06/10/2016 at 12:53

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Basically James May vs Jezza train of thought going on here.

ronmler3 > FN-2187 06/11/2016 at 14:51

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How do you do ANYTHING, legally, without ID?

FN-2187 > ronmler3 06/11/2016 at 17:44

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I don’t do anything. It’s not been fun

Flavien Vidal > SteveLehto 06/14/2016 at 00:52

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Hey Steve!

Did you switch to R&T? All your stories seem to be published there, while only your podcast gets shared on Jalopnik now?

SteveLehto > Flavien Vidal 06/14/2016 at 07:56

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I am at both. But the story/column stuff is there and the podcasts are here.

Flavien Vidal > SteveLehto 06/14/2016 at 08:14

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Oh ok, nice! You should post the R&T links on Oppo though as not everyone here goes to R&T.

You might read a couple stuff from me on R&T too btw :)

SteveLehto > Flavien Vidal 06/14/2016 at 09:15

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The problem is that anything posted on Oppo gets pushed off the front page within about 45 seconds so I’m not sure who would see it. But if you really wanted to make sure you saw all my stuff, you could follow me on twitter @stevelehto.

I don’t tweet a whole lot so following me won’t clutter your feed (if you are on twitter). I’ll look for your stuff!

Flavien Vidal > SteveLehto 06/14/2016 at 09:23

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I don’t use Twitter, nor facebook, nor... anything really lol :)

I do have a Twitter account though, I’ve just never used really used it. Post them at night, just before going to sleep. They’ll stay on the FP of Oppo all night...

And no need to do much about it... Just a quick link to R&T, copy paste of the title and that’s about it :)

If Travis finds enough time for it, first one should be posted today. Kind of exited to see my stuff on R&T. It’s the very first car magazine that wasn’t in french that I read so... :)

SteveLehto > Flavien Vidal 06/14/2016 at 09:28

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Do you live in France?

Flavien Vidal > SteveLehto 06/14/2016 at 09:37

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I am French, but I spent the past 2 years in Japan (where I currently live), married to a japanese, and the 10 years before that, in north america, between San Francisco, Seattle and Montreal :)

SteveLehto > Flavien Vidal 06/14/2016 at 10:37

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What is your email? I need help with something Japanese.

Flavien Vidal > SteveLehto 06/14/2016 at 10:43

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Flavien.vidal at this email thing from Google dot com :)

Going to sleep now though so it will probably be tomorrow :)

SteveLehto > Flavien Vidal 06/14/2016 at 10:48

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Email sent.

Standard_Deviation > SteveLehto 06/27/2016 at 23:58

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I used to work for the head office of a bank. It was my first job after graduating from University. While testing ATM software, I used to make the machines print out receipts showing 7-figure balances. I’d crumple up the receipts and leave them in my car, hoping the girls I was dating would snoop around and find said receipt, thus improving my odds...

Didn’t work. Either none of them snooped around, or they all realized that a guy with $3.4M in his account wouldn’t be driving a 17 year old Accord.

Also, I remember receiving a periodical that described methods used by criminals to defraud financial institutions. It contained some genuinely interesting and ingenious (but immoral) stuff!