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A young woman, "Maggie," came in to open a savings account last week. For the most part, my coworker dealt with Maggie, but she asked me to help when she started getting flack from the customer.
Maggie came to us because her parents have accounts with us, so she thought we would have no problem opening an account for her, too. But we pull credit reports for all new accounts, even savings. My coworker looked at the credit report and it said problem. Coworker tried to explain to Maggie that because of her horrendous credit, we couldn't open an account for her.
That's when the title line was spoken. Because her income was from social security, we HAD to open an account for her. Coworker called me over. I looked at the credit report. Maggie's credit score was 496. I don't think I've ever seen a credit score under 500 before. [We normally don't open accounts for anybody with a score under 650. High end is around 830.] Everything was "collection account," "account closed by credit grantor," or "profit and loss writeoff."
I started to tell Maggie there was no way. She held up a check. "You have to open the account, so I can deposit my social security check." I looked at the check. It wasn't a Treasury check. No, it was drawn on a 3rd party. It said something about "social security payee," and was made out to Maggie. I explained that customers sometimes bring in letters from the Social Security Administration that tell us how to set up the account so the customer can have their check direct deposited, but that's not what's happening here. We still can't open the account.
So Maggie stormed over to her mother, who was waiting in the lobby, and griped to her about it. She had me explain the whole thing to her mother. I suggested they contact the place the check was drawn on to figure out what to do next. I was nice about the whole thing while they grumbled and yapped at me.
Maggie's mother asked if Maggie could sign the check over to her, then could she cash it? I said yes, but we'd have to place a hold on the check or the same amount of money in the mother's checking account. That gave them both more reason to grumble, but they accepted it.
[what I wanted to say]Seriously? You have over $12,000 in collection accounts and you expect us to open ANY type of account for you? Even savings? We'll be processing levies and garnishments every WEEK! And that's whether or not you keep any money in the account. If you set up automatic payments, I'd expect you to be overdrawn within a month. No effing way! [/what I wanted to say]
Maggie came to us because her parents have accounts with us, so she thought we would have no problem opening an account for her, too. But we pull credit reports for all new accounts, even savings. My coworker looked at the credit report and it said problem. Coworker tried to explain to Maggie that because of her horrendous credit, we couldn't open an account for her.
That's when the title line was spoken. Because her income was from social security, we HAD to open an account for her. Coworker called me over. I looked at the credit report. Maggie's credit score was 496. I don't think I've ever seen a credit score under 500 before. [We normally don't open accounts for anybody with a score under 650. High end is around 830.] Everything was "collection account," "account closed by credit grantor," or "profit and loss writeoff."
I started to tell Maggie there was no way. She held up a check. "You have to open the account, so I can deposit my social security check." I looked at the check. It wasn't a Treasury check. No, it was drawn on a 3rd party. It said something about "social security payee," and was made out to Maggie. I explained that customers sometimes bring in letters from the Social Security Administration that tell us how to set up the account so the customer can have their check direct deposited, but that's not what's happening here. We still can't open the account.
So Maggie stormed over to her mother, who was waiting in the lobby, and griped to her about it. She had me explain the whole thing to her mother. I suggested they contact the place the check was drawn on to figure out what to do next. I was nice about the whole thing while they grumbled and yapped at me.
Maggie's mother asked if Maggie could sign the check over to her, then could she cash it? I said yes, but we'd have to place a hold on the check or the same amount of money in the mother's checking account. That gave them both more reason to grumble, but they accepted it.
[what I wanted to say]Seriously? You have over $12,000 in collection accounts and you expect us to open ANY type of account for you? Even savings? We'll be processing levies and garnishments every WEEK! And that's whether or not you keep any money in the account. If you set up automatic payments, I'd expect you to be overdrawn within a month. No effing way! [/what I wanted to say]
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