Runaround

Three and a half years later, Kris is still dealing with the fallout from her mom's death.  At the time she died, Kris had to go around and get all of her parents' accounts changed over to be in her dad's name only.  Most places she had to go were very freindly and helpful.  Then there were others that were more of a hassle.  One in particular was a savings account at a credit union in Milwaukee.  The closest branch was on 76th street near state fair park (there was another branch somewhere in the 'da hood too, and we didn't want to go there) but they wouldn't do anything over the phone.  The amount of money in the account was minimal so Kris just left it alone.

So last month we got a notice from them saying that we needed to convert to a "paperless statement".  If we didn't and they had to send us a paper statement they would charge her dad $2.00 per month.  Kris called to try and rectify the problem, but they wouldn't help her over the phone, they said she had to come into the branch to take care of it.  So then she figured she would just go online and register the account for a paperless statement.  Unfortunately, there was some problem preventing her from doing that when she tried.

After a lot of frustration she finally figured we should just drive down there and take care of it, though she didn't know if they would accept the paperwork showing that she had POA for her dad.  We got all paperwork from the lawyers when her mom died and brought it along, not knowing exactly what was required. 

When we got there it was lunchtime so there were only two tellers working, and one was in the process of helping a man who was trying to close out his accounts.  When she asked why, he said mainly it was the hours, that they weren't open late on any days or on Saturday mornings, so they were never able to get to the bank to do any of their banking, so he was closing all of his accounts and moving them to a more convenient bank (boy that sounds familiar).  I looked at the hours on a small advertising leaflet and it said their lobby hours were 11:00-4:00.  That sounds like it might be hard to get there unless you weren't working.  The other teller was running between the guy in front of us and the drive thru, looking like she was a little overwhelmed.  I figured we weren't going to get anywhere with her. 

To my surprise, she was actually very helpful.  Kris explained the situation to her and took all over her paperwork and made copies of it.  Kris then had to fill out a couple of forms and then the woman said she was going to submit it all and they should be sending Kris a check for a grand total of nine dollars and change and the account would be closed.  She also said she was going to make a note on the paperwork to refund back the $2.00 service charge.  I think that is the least they can do, though it remains to be seen.  Hopefully this will finally take care of it.