Washington Mutual Bank - Online Banking - Customer Service issues

Washington Mutual Bank - Online Banking - Customer Service issues

Washington Mutual Bank / Online Banking / Customer Service

Winnetka, CA

Washington Mutual

Washington Mutual's web site was "Temporarily Unavailable" on April 12, 2004 when I tried to access my online bill pay account. So I called 800-788-7000 and explained to "Tony" that I had two payments that had to be initiated that day in order to be on time. Tony said I could give him the payment info and the payments would be processed. I gave Tony the payee names, but when I asked him if he needed the payees' addresses he said "no" because that info was in his system. I did give him the memos and account numbers to be listed on the checks. He even gave me a confirmation number for the payments.

I went online April 13 and noticed that the payments had not been processed. I immediately called the same 800 number and when I told the man who answered that I was worried my payments had not been made, he said "if you incur any fees, we'll pay them". That didn't make sense to me, I told him I don't want to be late on these payments, one is my car insurance and it CAN'T be late. Then he said "if you talked to someone here then I'm sure the payments will go through, just give it a couple of days".

When I insisted that I needed to be SURE the payments were scheduled to be made from my account this guy told me that he saw documentation of my conversation with Tony and that the payments were scheduled. When I asked him to verify what the payments were, he suddenly couldn't find the documentation that he supposedly was just looking at. He was obviously just trying to get me off the phone from the moment he picked it up! He then told me that I needed to call back the next day during regular business hours.

Well, I called the next day and was on the phone for 41 minutes (my phone has a timer). The supervisor I spoke with said that there was no documentation of my 4/12 and 4/13 calls and on top of that the confirmation number from Tony was useless. The sup advised me to take my payments personally to the payees if I wanted them to be on time. I explained that this next to impossible for me because of the payees' locations and my schedule. When I asked how Wa Mu was going to rectify this mistake he said there was NOTHING they could do. Isn't Wa Mu a bank? Don't banks make electronic transfers every day?

Why wouldn't he do this for me, especially considering that it was THEIR FAULT the payments weren't sent when they should have been. Not once did he apologize for the HUGE inconvenience this has been for me (three LONG phone calls and now I have to take time from work to make these payments). Instead he kept insinuating that the 4/12 and 4/13 phone calls never took place, just because they weren't in listed on his computer screen. I practically begged him to track down a Tony who was working at 6:57pm CA time on 4/12 and he said he couldn't do that. He then said that it was my fault for not getting Tony's extension!

I opened my first bank account with Great Western in 1989. GW was taken over by WA MU and I've been with them ever since. My mortgage and IRA accounts are also at WA MU. If I had just been offered a sincere apology and some help and maybe was treated with a little humanity it could have turned out to be a somewhat positive experience as far as Wa Mu's customer service goes. But instead I WAS TREATED LIKE A LIAR and SOMEONE WHO DOESN'T MATTER to them. I will be switching banking/mortgage institutions and will tell everyone who will listed what HORRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE can be expected from Washington Mutual.

Laura

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WAMU froze my account, even though there is $19,000 in the account. With no explanation, and i tried to call customer service and only got recordings. NO PERSON TO TALK TO! No live help phone number listed, and no reason to freeze my account during my vacation!! (memorial Day Weekend) WTF