From Startup Whisperer
We all know how bad the use of tax payer dollars has been by the banks. We have not seen the easing of lending in the system that is required to start a strong recover. In addition, we have all heard the stories of new fees charged by banks to consumers.
It pained me to right this post. I am not a fan of flaming companies or using public forums to highlight personal customer service issues. I find them self centered but since I write about lots of different types of business issues on the Startup WhispererTM, I thought that I would use a personal plight of mine to reflect on how company acquisitions are often botched causing customer defection and negative synergies for the acquirer.
I have been a Washington Mutual customer for many years and they have lost me as a customer. It pains me to do so. But, the acquisition by Chase has severely impacted the manner in which customers are valued at the now mega bank. We’ve seen a bunch of posts recently about bad acquisition planning and behavior cause major problems for customers and enterprise value for all involved (like this recent post from a Seattle-based company). There are some obvious things that big and small companies need to remember during phasing in new processes, infrastructure, and communication during an acquisition. Namely:
- Remember that customers are not robots – Robots are robots. Customers typically have an emotional connection to a brand or service. If you try to move too rapidly to change certain behaviors, you (the acquirer) will run into resistance and/or customer defection. Its easy to make a financial decision but planning for that change needs to be thoughtful and consistent over a well thought out timeline.
- Customers have choices – customer service has to be one of the hardest jobs. You can win or lose a customer based on the manner in which you deal with a customer service problem. As customers, we all know that their is a spaghetti landscape of phone systems, call center locations (yes, some are international-based), and customer service levels. You can tell which company has invested in customer service as a strategic weapon to engender customer loyalty. A great example is Zappos (here is a post from the SW). My own proxy was Washington Mutual versus Wells Fargo. Night and day. Wells Fargo was far more efficient in dealing with issues and concerns than Washington Mutual. If you are running a low margin, commoditized business like banking, don’t forget where your asset value comes from — your customers.
- Don’t fire your good customers – you read a lot about how its wise to fire your unprofitable customers. That makes sense to me. It doesn’t make sense to fire your best customers. Banks are doing this by increasing fees and changing their products on their best customers. As we all have heard countless times over the intercom when we land on any flight these days, “..we know you have a choice of airlines and we appreciated your business.” Unlike some air routes where you might have 3 really good choices in terms of service and pricing advantage in the airlines for any given route, there are a lot more choices for banks as consumers.
So, why am I firing Washington Mutual. Using the template above, here are the mistakes made by WAMU over the last several months:
- Increase fees without notification to their customers – I am a high valued customer and where in the past fees were low or waived, that is not happening now.
- Arbitrary increases in APR without notification
- Go green and get f@#$*! – Moving to paperless statements means you don’t get email alerts when bills are due. I guess you are a troglodyte if you don’t know to setup alerts for paperless bill notification. Of course, its not automatic. The attitude (from the bank) is that we as customers should spend a bunch of time in their online credit card system configuring those types of features. Of course, that’s not automatic.
- Changes to the online payment product – you can’t do certain types of payment methods (e.g., payment to the same payee 2x month). There are a bunch of changes to the Washington Mutual online product that have made my life more of a hassle.
- Fraud? Don’t worry about it. – I caught a fraudulent transaction and the bank didn’t think to offer up canceling my debit card. That floored me. Of course, it is now going to take me 14 days to get a new one. It wont matter now since by then I will have ported over to a new bank.
The individuals at the bank are phenomenal (at WAMU). At one point many of my family and friends have worked at Washington Mutual. But, as we all know the values of an acquirer set the mood from the back office to the front office. Chase has certainly set the mood for their entity. It is not a good one. Take note if you are an acquirer or acquiree. Treat acquistions almost like a product launch. Build a roadmap. Make it an operational product launch. Make it operational bulletproof and be careful on not powering consumer defection.
About nathan kaiser
I work for Wamu…now Chase. Alll of these changes are Chase and have nothing to do with Wamu which is now fighting the FDIC and JPMC in court. You should be using the name “Chase” when gripping about this stuff as they have changed everything.
Chase sks and stole WAMU. How can you trust them with your own money? I would not deal with a company who had blindly stolen others assets coming in as a counselor to WAMU at first. They had no conscious then and they may not have any conscious now to abuse your accounts. Move your account over; there are many other reputable choices.
I had pretty good experience with Wamu. My last visit to Chase was not bad either. People were friendly and helpful.
I’m not very happy about being bumped over to Chase. The reason why I chose Washington Mutual was because it was a lean corporation without a lot of the fees the big boys dump on the customer to suck a few extra bucks out of them. I also thought their customer service was exceptional. Now with big corporate Chase I have this horrible feeling that customer service will be something cut the name of profits.
When I last saw a Chase teller I asked when the fee increases were coming and where to expect to see them. She said that in October, Chase would completely take over their ownership of Washington Mutual. I have to expect that is when the main body of changes will descend, but I am reading already many people are getting hit with huge credit card changes like new mininum balances. I am considering switching to a new bank when my checks for Wa-Chase run out. I’m thinking Wells Fargo. After all they did Wachiova justice by offering seven times more than what Citibank was going to pay. Does the FDIC have a clue?
‘Henry’ Morgan Chase’s pirate ship is something I don’t want to be a sailor on, for many reasons.
Chase recently cheated me out of over $500 on a wire transfer from UK.
The exchange rate for that day was 1.457 they gave me 1.3973 for conversion from UK Pounds to US$.
I fighting this ….. but not sure best course, perhaps small claims court.
Troy – Chase “completely” took over Wamu as soon as the merger was announced on Sept. 25. All of the changes you have seen since then have been Chase decisions… the only change that October (for Washington branches) represents is the re-brand, where they lose the Wamu name, and the Chase name/branding is fully implemented.
There is no way I will go with CHASE.
Why would I do that if I know from the past experiences with them – that they stole so much money from me!
They sent me a check for $100 to open account with them, I did not fall for it.
Would never do it no matter how much they offer. The stress and pain they cause by taking the money out of your account whenever it suites them is — unexplainable.
It is 5/8/2009 and I am shopping for another checking account with some other non-stealing bank.
Wamu was wonderful. The best bank ever! They took care of me… they were consistent and always looked what is best in my interest.
I had a manager in my location who would alert me by calling me to add the cash BEFORE he would charge me any fee. I don’t remember when did I pay any fees with WAMU.
CHASE was just the opposite…… they did everything to take as much money from you at all times.
I had accounts with other banks and CHASE took over so I —- stupid —- stayed with CHASE believing they will take care of customers.
OMG what kind of things I experienced with them, it is undescribable.
Never ever again I will put myself through that pain, ever again!
So I finally closed all my CHASE accounts 2 years ago and went with WAMU – and will never repeat that horrible experience.
Why would I allow them to use my money to get richer while they slam me with fees and always managed to go around it ( no rules )… so you end up paying and they end up re-inventing another excuse for taking another $30 fee from your hard working money!
Never in my life would I give them a chance to use me that way again!!
People please come to your senses. CHASE is the worst bank you can have business with. Do not help them by staying, I wish WAMU survived and CHASE vanished!!!
WAMU deserved to be of service to us. It was great bank.
Sincerely — you would be insane to go with CHASE. There must be another non-stealing bank to pick from!!!
By not staying with them CHASE will have no choice but to either change their stealing habits or they will vanish.
This is our moral duty… not to help stealing banks to use us to get richer.
But to give a chance to smaller banks like WAMU to survive and carry on the good work and great service.
I will be leaving Chase in June when I pay off my credit card. I loved Wamu’s customer service, now I’m “stuck” with subpar, overseas robots that do not care about their customers.
I am SO thankful that I do not bank with these people and only have a credit card with them that is easy to close.
This month my interest rate was increased without my knowledge within the past month. I have a credit limit of 1,000 dollars with them, and I was close to the limit. The finances charges (almost 25 bucks) caused me to go over the limit, and I was THEN charged an over the limit FEE for going over.
When I called to ask if the over the limit fee could be waived one time as a courtesy I was told by a robot like person with a very thick. unintelligible accent that “the fee is valid, and therefore cannot be waived.” I asked to speak with a supervisor but was “assured that the supervisor would only tell me the same thing and that I was wasting my time.” I was then told the same thing by yet another supervisor robot.
They will miss me as a customer. While I only have a 1,000 dollar credit limit with them, I pay it off entirely at LEAST quarterly, if not more often.
I miss Wamu’s customer service the most! Chase is a HORRIBLE bank.
I am also very unhappy since Chase took over WaMu. Chase customer service is terrible. I’ve had my WaMu card for years (since it was a Providian card!). I don’t have late payments, and I don’t carry large balances. First, Chase changed the payment due dates on both my and my husband’s cards without any prior notice. They set it back over a week! So when I went to pay the bills for the month, they were already late, and Chase had collected their $39 apiece! The next month, every charge I tried to make, Chase declined because of “possible fraud.” They called me, and I verified that all of the “suspicious” activity was indeed mine and there was no fraud. They said the card was OK to use again.
That very evening, I tried to make a purchase, and it was again declined! I called to straighten it out, and the call center employee (“John” but obviously that was his “American name”—it seems that Chase outsources its customer service to a clearinghouse) told me they were missing vital personal information in their database. I “updated” my full name and birth date (um, this info. WAS in my profile when I was with Providian and then WaMu—did it disappear?).
I asked what I needed to do to be able to use may card again. John said he had to ask me security questions based on my SSN (which he did NOT get from me); it was apparently already “in the system.” He starts asking the multiple-choice questions based on the public record that we’ve all heard before—except none of these questions had to do with ME! Two questions in, I told John that these questions had nothing to do with me and asked him to verify they had my correct SSN, which he said he could not! I asked for a supervisor (“Liz”) who told me I’d failed the security check (the questions) and thus my account was now locked under “fraud review” until a fraud specialist could determine that I wasn’t an identity thief.
I explained that perhaps, just perhaps, seeing as they had other info. missing/incorrect in my profile, that they had my SSN incorrect in the profile (maybe a sloppy data import from WaMu’s database into Chase’s?). I asked Liz to open my file and check my SSN to see if it was correct. She said she could not. Seriously?! She said, “You could be anyone who happens to know some info. about A—– H—– just saying the questions weren’t about you. You failed the questions, so I can’t verify you are who you say you are.”
Liz, you were missing my entire point that the QUESTIONS were perhaps based on flawed data (possible incorrect SSN in their system), and refusing to check the system because I had “failed” the questions (I said the questions weren’t about me after I heard the second one—I did NOT answer them incorrectly) is the very definition of a Catch 22! All she could say was that the fraud specialist (read: ACTUAL Chase employee) would review my case and “get back to me” in “the next few days or so.” Her demeanor was as if she was reading from a script and could care less. I suspect she’d have repeated the same phrases over and over even if I hung up the phone and left her speaking to silence. I told her to note my dissatisfaction in their system and to expedite my review (I am leaving the country on vacation, so I need access to my card!). Her response: “I’ll note it.” Thanks for the commitment to quality customer service there, Liz. I’m all for fraud protection, but my other credit card providers do just as good a job protecting my accounts with better (more “empowered” to check info. in the database!) service representatives while still managing to avoid the nonsensical, Catch 22, I-can’t-think-for-myself-so-I-just-repeat-my-script, frustrating customer “service.”
Find out the truth about the Washington Mutual Seizure.www.wamutruth.com
We were, like many others, forced over to Chase. I am angry that those in charge at Wamu put us in the position of having to bank with Chase. I do not like this bank they are sneeky underhanded crooks. We had a credit card through Wamu that carried a 0% interest rate for the first year since I transfered a balance over. Once Chase got a hold of that, we missed receiving a bill from Chase after their take over one month and I didn’t think of it, I get my bills in the mail and then I pay them. I kept thinking that it seemed like a long time since I had paid that credit card and then finally got a bill in the new Chase envelope. I opened it to find that I owed for 2 months and now I would be paying interest and high interest for being late. I called, then my husband tried calling. I told them we never got the bill but they blamed Wamu and said that they should have sent the bill, and would not remove the late fee’s and the new interest rate. I always paid on time and paid more than what I owed, that is on record, they can see that. I guess it was too much of an opportunity to pass up for them. They needed that interest I guess. I am switching banks, paying that credit card asap, and will never darken a Chase doorway again. I have yet to find a bank like Wamu but there must be one out there, I will find it and when I do I will be done with Chase. My daughter already got out of there, she did not like them either, I can’t remember what they pulled on her but that should be her story to tell anyways. Dangit Wamu you really put us in a position!
It’s true!
CHASE does not care about WAMU customers.
I am also leaving the bank, eventhough I was a very satisfied WAMU customer for years. My reasons: I do not like banks that charge for everything like CHASE.
They send me a nasty letter to let me know I was exceeding the number of transactions allowed per month and stating that I was going to be charged. They charge for something that was completely free with WAMU.
Goodbye WAMU/CHASE!!!!!!
I was a WAMU customer for ten years. Recently I returned from a four year international assignment and was shocked to see my historical ‘free checking account’ was charged a $15 annual service fee under the new management of Chase. After a $700 billion taxpayer bailout of the banking industry, I would have thought Chase would have acted more ethically to its customers who are experiencing the same systemic financial crisis, but without the benefit of taxpayer bailout funds. Chase has welcomed its new customers with a deceptive charge. I am going to cancel my Chase banking account and encourage others to avoid this greedy bank.
Chase Bank stinks. We had been happily with WAMU for years till the switch. I pulled most of my cash from my checking account and closed the WAMU credit card. I did this to see how Chase would treat it’s former WAMU customers and because they raised our credit card interest and cut back the grace period days. Service got worse and worse till the final straw came when I went in to cash a money order and they refused to because they said “We are not a check cashing facility”. I could no longer cash checks there and I had a account there for pete’s sake? Come on guys isn’t that what banks are supposed to do for their account holders? All I can say is “hasta la vista baby!”
I have never so heated in a long time. Chase bank has some of my daughters college money hihacked. During the busy summer her CD matured i missed the 7 day grace period and thought well the 3 month of internest isnt that much I’ll cash it and take the less than $10.00 Penalty the amount of the CD was only 1800.00 and it renewed for .20 percent interest. When I went into the bank to cash it and move it to a savings they inform me the fee is 81.00 dollars. Oh my gosh at .20 I wouldnt even get that amout of interest in 10 years off that. I called there call center in houston and this guy tells me .20 is the going rate for cd’s with less than 9,9999, fir 1 year…..crap……When I opened this account I never said it was ok to charge me 25.00 for closing the account prior to maturity and a 3% FEE on the amount of the withdrawl. They have hijacked my daughters money for free for another year. I’m glad i moved most of our kids monies to Key Bank and only wish I would have moved it all.
NEVER HAVE I EVER IN MY 40 YEARS IF LIVING BE SO SCREWED AS I HAVE BEEN BY CHASE!!!!!!!
WAMU VS. CHASE???? PLEASE BRING WAMU BACK!!!!!!!!!! CHASE IS RUINING THE ECONOMY FASTER THAN IT IS RUINING ITSELF…LIKE IT NEEDS ANY HELP THESE DAYS??
IT IS A NO-BRAINER THAT CHASE IS DEFINITELY NAMED CORRECTLY – THEY ARE “CHASING” AWAY ALL OF THE WAMU CUSTOMERS THAT ARE USE TO BEING TREATED FAIRLY, WITH HIGH REGARD FOR THEIR CUSTOMERS AS PEOPLE AND NOT AS MEAR “PROFITING TOOLS”!!
IN THE 5 YEARS OF BEING A WAMU CUSTOMER, HAVE HAD NOTHING BUT AMAZINGLY NICE EXPERIENCES THERE! I COULDN’T BELIEVE HOW SMOOTHLY IT WAS RAN!! WAMU CUSTOMER SERVICE WAS A TRUE TESTAMENT TO CUSTOMER SERVICE – COMING FROM WORKING IN THE CUSTOMER SERVICE INDUSTRY MYSELF FOR 20+ YEARS, AND HAVING BEEN COMMENDED FOR MY INTENSE APPRECIATION FOR CUSTOMERS AND THE OBVIOUSLY AGE OLD AND FORGOTTEN SLOGAN, “THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT”, I HAVE JUST IN THE PAST WEEK EXPERIENCED SOME OF THE WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE EVER, ESPECIALLY COMING FROM THOSE THAT ARE CONTROLLING WHAT LITTLE MONEY I DO HAVE!
I WENT FROM HAVING OVER $100,000 IN THE BANK TO HAVING A LITTLE OVER $100.00 IN THE BANK, DUE TO A MOTORCYCLE ACCIDENT THAT WASN’T EVEN MY FAULT, MY WIFE AND I ARE BOTH OUT OF WORK AND HAVE BEEN NOW FOR OVER A YEAR.
FIRST – NEVER HAVE I HAD TO WAIT FOR MORE THAN MAYBE 1-2 MINUTES TO BE WAITED ON. NOW… THE PAST 3 TIMES I’VE BEEN IN THERE I’VE HAD TO WAIT OVER 20 MINUTES! ALONG WITH SEVERAL OTHER “NOW” ANGRY CUSTOMERS!!
SECOND – I JUST THOUGHT BANK OF AMERICA WAS THE WORST BANK EVER, WELL CHASE HAS SURPASSED THEM!!! AT LEAST WACHOVIA AND BANK OF AMERICA WILL DO SOMETHING AS SIMPLE AS NOTARIZE A DOCUMENT THAT IS FOR AN ACCOUNT HOLDER!! WELL, CHASE WON’T DO THAT MUCH!! THEY WILL ONLY NOTARIZE “CHASE” DOCUMENTS FOR “CHASE” ACCOUNT HOLDERS!! UNBELIEVABLE!!!!
THIRD – REC’D A CHECK FROM INSURANCE COMPANY FOR A CONSIDERABLE AMOUNT OF MONEY, WHICH IS A GOD-SEND SO WE WERE ABLE TO PAY OUR MORTGAGE. WELL, AFTER TAKING THE CHECK, AND BECAUSE IT WAS WRITTEN TO MY WIFE, BECAUSE THEY WOULD NOT PUT MY WIFE ON MY ACCOUNT, AND THEY SAID THEY WOULD BE FINE WITH IT SINCE MY WIFE SIGNED IT IN FRONT OF THEM AND ME OVER TO ME TO DEPOSIT – AND BECAUSE IT WAS NOT A “CHASE” CHECK IT WAS WRITTEN ON, THE FUNDS WOULD NOT BE AVAILABLE UNTIL THE NEXT BUSINESS DAY. OK…SO SINCE WE WERE ADVISED THAT, ALREADY NOT BELIEVING THAT #*%*)*&% UNHEARD OF RULE, WE CALL IN OUR MORTGAGE PAYMENT THAT NIGHT. THE NEXT MORNING WE FIND OUT THAT THE FUNDS ARE NOT AVAILABLE!!! I IMMEDIATELY CALLED THE BANK, EXPLAINED, WE SERIOUSLY COULD LOSE OUR HOME IF THIS CHECK TO OUR MORTGAGE COMPANY IS NOT GOOD, THEY REPLY WITH A VERY NONCHALANT, “THERE’S NOTHING WE CAN DO” AND “IT’S UNFORTUNATE”!!!!! WE’RE TALKING ABOUT OUR LIVES NOW POSSIBLY BEING ON THE STREET!!! AND THIS IS ALL THEY HAD TO SAY????? WAMU WOULD HAVE IMMEDIATELY ALLOWED THE FUNDS TO BE AVAILABLE, PROBABLY PAID US FOR OUR TIME,EVEN!! I MEAN THEY WERE THAT NICE AND PERSONAL AS WAMU!!! NOW JUST ANOTHER CORPORATION GETTING THERE’S – AND I DON’T MEAN GETTING WHAT THEY DESERVE!
THIS IS SERIOUS!!!!!! AND HOW THEY DON’T CARE AT ALL ABOUT THE CUSTOMERS!!!
WE’VE HAD WAMU GIVE US EXCEPTIONAL SERVICE! CHASE IS KILLING US, A SLOW AND VERY PAINFUL DEATH!!!
ISN’T THERE SOMEWAY TO GET A CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT AGAINST THEM FOR BATE AND SWITCH, OR FALSE ADVERTISING, OR SOMETHING I’M SURE THEY ARE DOING ILLEGALLY WITH EVERYONE’S MONEY????
WE’RE SITTING HERE ABOUT TO GO UNDER, WITH OUR HANDS TIED, AND THE BANK THAT USE TO BE LIKE PART OF THE FAMILY HAS NOW BECOME OUR WORST NIGHTMARE!!!!
DOES ANYONE KNOW OF A BANK WE CAN ALL MOVE ON TO??? I’M SURE I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE NEEDING AN ANSWER TO THIS QUESTION NOW.
I was a WAMU customer for 6 years. I opened my first checking account at 18 years old and stayed with them the whole time. I even referred people to “my bank” because it was so good. Now Chase is screwing me. As other people have noted, charges will remain pending for inconsistent amounts of time, cash deposits don’t post right away and they move things around so they can hit you with as many NSF fees as they can. I’m going there today to close my account.
I also used to have a good experiance with Wamu for 10 years. I used to come in with large checks $8000 plus and they would give me imediate credit because of my long track record and not one check I have deposited was ever returned for non suf’t funds. The other day I came in to deposit a $9000 check ( this was from my pension plan with Sony Electronics) and they said their would be a 5 day hold on 1/2 and a 11 day hold on the other half. I then asked to see the lady that has always given me credit for large checks and she said their was nothing she could do anymore because of Chase polices are a lot stricter than wamus were. I have decided to change banks. How is US bank or Pacific bak, Rabobank? Any one know of any good banks in the Southern Cal area. (temecula/Murrieta area?)
I am also sadden by Chase taking over WAMU. Every time I see ads for Chase or the new logo, I feel a little sad.
Even if I was never a loyal fan to WAMU ( my main bank is Union Bank since I’ve been with them longer and no problems there).
But I would use WAMU as a back up bank every now and then. And they have been pretty nice.
I happily bailed on Chase a couple of months ago and I am now with a credit union. Chase’s funds availability policies annoyed me, but I was almost willing to live with them, given the hassle of changing banks. What made me decide was what I observed while standing in line at a branch one day.
A customer was depositing a check, and needed at least some of the funds immediately. At Wamu, the teller generally had the authority to make available funds, even if a hold was initially placed, unless there had been account abuse. In this case, the teller told the customer — almost quoting — “we can’t make these funds available. What if the check is returned unpaid?” How do I know this? Because the teller was tactless enough to say these things in a somewhat loud tone of voice in front of all the other people in the bank!
Mind you, I understand if the bank’s policies prevented making the funds immediately available. What I could not stomach was the insinuation that a customer was dishonest, and the absolutely awful treatment the person was given.
One of the other posts here says it is sad to see the Chase signs. I felt a bit melancholy when I first saw the Chase signs as well. Now though, I feel a bit empowered when I walk past a Chase branch. I like to think that moving my business elsewhere is my own little payback to Chase, on behalf of the customer I saw being treated so badly.
I’m on my way to look for another bank and sad that WAMU was bought out, I was a loyal happy customer, and bragged constantly about WAMU! Definately I knew this day would come that I would start seeing unpopular changes from Chase – so far here are some items that turned me off: Debit Rewards stopped last month (September 2009), last visit I was told sometime soon no more “free checks”; yesterday i was just was handed a notice from the teller effective October 26 funds for Non-Chase Check deposited will not be available until next business day; the list goes on….WAMU PLEASE COME BACK!!!!
I recently went in to Chase to deposit a check into my business checking account. Formerly with WaMu I could do this with no problem and withdraw cash on that as well. Now, with Chase, they put at least a one day hold on all business deposits that are not Chase checks. This is no joke even though it seems like the most ridiculous policy.
Also, you cannot do transfers on line over the weekend. (Really? come on…) Although Chase will have no problem taking money OUT of your account via Debit card transactions over the weekend or on a holiday. It’s the most ridiculous set of rules.
I have to say I looked at the poor Chase, formerly WaMu teller, when doing that deposit with a dumbfounded look on my face. He apologized but showed me the rule in writing. I told him that was the dumbest business decision Chase could have made.
I will be moving my business, and two personal checking accounts and my two savings accounts to a new bank as soon as possible.
Chase with it’s policies, while trying to prevent fraud and NSF deposits, is just making bad business decisions and I refuse to reward that kind of corporate behavior with my business.
I am firing Chase as well. Please join my Facebook group “WaMu Customers Who Hate Chase” and post your horror stories.
I had paying all my monthly bills online with Wamu for several years before the Chase takeover. The second month after the conversion, I received a past due notice from one of my creditors along with a finance charge. I checked the Chase website and found the payment had been returned. The creditor said they never received it. After phone maze hell, one hour and four customer service reps, I found out that Chase had the wrong address for the payee and the wrong contact information for me on the payment. In fact, every payment I have made since the conversion had bad data. Everything looked fine online: my contact information was correct, and the payee addresses were correct. But when you looked at the payment details, the information was incorrect. Chase refused to pay the late fee because the address on the payment was incorrect – they deemed it my fault. I’ve thought that these guys systems were bullet proof. I was wrong. And they don’t stand behind it.