ypsi~dixit

This news is nowhere, incidentally, but in the obscure magazine I linked to.

MLive story here

Oopsie, missed that story in my search, my mistake. I did like today's story about the nabbed Ann Arbor spammer.

Hm. The Mlive story is from Wednesday. The Credit Union's announcement was on Thursday.

Looks they were trying to keep it quiet but were forced to make an announcement due to the News story.

Doesn't seem like a trustworthy management style to me.

It's disappointing to hear that the credit union held onto this information. I'm sure that their PR department was scrambling, and someone made a bad call to keep it under wraps.

I won't at all defend the decision for them to not announce it; that was a bad call. And it makes me wonder how many financial institutions and retail businesses successfully sweep stories like this under the rug.

I believe credit unions and banks need to be educated on transparency, and the best way for them to learn is from this story making its way around both traditional press and blog posts a la Kryptonite - who seems to have learned from their experience with the lock video, as to their credit they're careful to be open/transparent now.

I found the credit union to have totally woeful record-keeping when I used to be a member.

I belonged to the credit union the year after I graduated from college. I also joined the YMCA, and in order to get a discount, I authorized payments to the Y directly from my credit union checking account. Well, the year after that I moved away, discontinued my YMCA membership and the auto-payments. Then, I moved back to Ann Arbor for grad school, and *six* years later, I was going over a stack of bank statements and noticed something weird -- a $20 payment to the YMCA every month for each of the previous six months (yes, I should have noticed sooner). Turns out that the YMCA had restored their membership records from back-up (VERY OLD backups) and had started deducting money from my account -- totally unencumbered by the Credit Union. When I went in to speak with them about it, they told me that basically, whenever you authorize a payment, the person you're paying can reinstate it anytime -- any number of years later -- and they will go ahead and pay it! I thought that was a pretty bad situation. Seems they should be able to keep their records up to date and when they have in writing that the payments are to be discontinued, it should somehow stick.

But almost equally weird/annoying, as I was moving out of town, my wallet was stolen at a rest stop. I cancelled my credit union ATM card and requested a new one. I asked them to please rush it because I had just moved to a new city in a new state where my checks weren't being accepted, and I had no access to cash, and my next paycheck was six weeks away. They assured me it was on the way. It took *two months* for my card to get to me. With excitement, I went to the local grocery store and tried to take out money with my ATM card -- zip, swallowed up by the ATM machine. Turns out that they'd forgotten to remove the "stolen card" alert. So, I waited another two weeks for a second new card, went to use it, ZIP, swallowed again. Waited for another card, ZIP, swallowed a third time. I finally got a working card. The next year, when I got back to Ann Arbor, I went to the ATM machine to use my card and didn't pull the card out fast enough while putting my receipt and the money away, so it was swallowed by the machine. Fortunately, it was the machine at the branch on Williams, so I walked in and asked them to get my card out. They said that they couldn't do that, I had to fill out an application for a new card. I promptly went to the second floor to do it, filled it out and gave it to one of the employees. She looked at it typed some things into the computer, and informed me that it was going to be the last ATM card I could *EVER* get for the account. I asked why, she said it was because this card was going to be my sixth one. I told her about the eaten cards while after the wallet theft, she said they had no record of that and that I could just forget getting another card! Anyway, I closed my account with them. Idiots.
(sorry about the rant... apparently I still have a little latent resentment toward them...).

The UMCU told us (customers) in the March timeframe and gave us free credit monitoring. Every week I get an email that lets me know if anything has happened that would affect my credit, such as a new credit line.

I've been A UMCU member for 30 years now and never had the kind of problems Anna mentions. But, I've heard of others who've had more problems than I have, certainly.

The reason I like being a credit union member is because I get the chance to have a say by either writing to the board of directors or showing up at a meeting. For anyone who has problems, I suggest doing just that. They have to listen to us -- we're members, not customers.

I all, I think I was a member for 8 years and those were the "only" two incidents, but they were whoppers! I should have gone and made a stinnk at a meeting. Actually, when I was complaining about the putative six cards and about the YMCA charges, the person I was complaining to should have told me it was an option. I always found those people on the second floor to be extremely unhelpful.

When I finally decided to close my account, the woman said cheerfully, "OK!". I said, "Are you curious about why someone who's been a member for 8 years is closing her account?". She said that she wasn't, but I could fill out a comment card. Whatever. I've been way more happy with USAA, but you have to be a veteran or the child of a vet to be eligible.

I've been considering opening a UMCU account for awhile... may reconsider now. Yikes!

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