Do you think paying fees are great? Then this is the place to bank
Written: May 02 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: One of the few banks on East and West Coasts, decent online site.
Cons: High fees, Impersonal service can leave you feeling kind of crappy.
The Bottom Line: This bank is not for students or small-time people. Even if you can meet their minimum balances to avoid fees, they only seem to excel at the fee-collecting business.
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| six13's Full Review: Citibank |
My school required me to have a California bank account to do business with them, so I joined Citibank when I started school in LA. Coming from New York, I wanted a bank that was on both coasts, as to have convenience and to avoid ATM fees regardless of what coast I was on.
Since they offered online banking, I chose Easy-Checking, which offered a good online site, one of the few positive things I could say about this bank. However the site was always slow to load up, even on a T1 high-speed line it took almost five minutes to get to the account page once I entered my number and password, getting around it was just as frustrating, and on several occasions I had to call customer service just to obtain basic information.
Customer service was generally okay, except for a couple of occasions. Once I had overdrawn (By the deduction of their monthly fee), and when I made a deposit at a branch, the teller had informed me of my overdraw like it was a cardinal sin, in a sarcastic tone. I also received another sarcastic response for not having overdraft protection which resulted in a long 7 day hold on a local check I deposited.
Which brings me to the fees. $7.50 per month for not keeping $1500 in the account. A $4.00 fee per month for using SOMEONE else's ATM. Why should I be penalized by my bank for using someone else's ATM? I stopped using Bank of America's ATM because I was being charged an additional $1.50 for each transaction by Citibank.
What made me leave Citibank was the total decimation of my account due to banks' profits-before-people thinking. I had deposited a CA check at a Citibank in NY that was based on an CA account (I found out then that Citibank in NY is not quite the same in CA). My online and teller statement showed the deposit and some additional funds that became available as a result of the deposit. I made purchases in NY based on this information, and figured out that there would be plenty of money left- even after everything had
cleared. Upon arrival in LA the account was down to nothing and the next day, it was way overdrawn by $140. (It was supposed to be $120 in the black). I found out that a check I had written three weeks earlier for $51 was paid out twice,(I still should have been ahead despite this and the fact I had deducted the check right after I wrote it),the check I deposited had an additional 7 day hold placed on it (I was assured it would be through in 3 days) which caused numerous $30 bounced check and unavailable funds fees to be imposed, which happened immediately.
On top of that I was charged monthly account fees as well the usual penalty for using another banks ATM. I was able to get the fees reduced to where I didn't owe them anything, after I had proved on statement and my own accounting that I was given false information,(yet another condescending sarcastic customer service experience) but I also lost all the money they took the minute things went wrong. They only did this when I threatened to close the account, which I did promptly thereafter.
The experience left me unable to pay some bills right away, without cash for a week, and a whole lot of shot nerves and anger. I have never felt so vulnerable to a large institution such as this. I feel like Citibank can determine when I can have my money and when they can take theirs. Take my advice and join a credit union if you can, the service is much better, they don't take you for a ride on fees, hold your money hostage, or penalize you by imposing minimum requirements on your account.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
six13
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Reviews written: 1
Trusted by: 0 members
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