Corporate Hall of Shame

Today's winner: ACHIEVA CREDIT UNION

As any small town resident, you want to support local businesses, so when we moved to Dunedin, we opted to do our banking through the local credit union.

It's been a rocky drive, but since 90% of banks are screwed up in one way or another, we've stuck with them.

There are, however, limits to what one can endure. To wit:

For years I have been asking Achieva to improve their online billpay service because it does not sync with your checking account, so you don't know what's outstanding or pending when making purchases.

Last month, I found out that the service would be unavailable for 10 days while they upgraded it. I found out by accident because I received no notice of the interruption.

So, 10 days later, I signed in to find out that all my payees/vendors had disappeared, along with any history of payments!

Gone. Just gone.

So I went to the branch and found a full parking lot, and a full lobby of people complaining.

A service rep couldn't find any of my records but promised to get them to me that day.

I then received a typed list of payers for me to type into the system. Half were missing, and half were discontinued years ago.

I called and they agreed to reenter all the payers for me. They did, with, again, half missing.

So, on Good Friday, I entered all my new payess and all my payments for the month.

I hit 'submit'

It asked me to enter a verification code... so I clicked 'I don't have a code

It told me to call a number to get one.

I called.

"You've reached ACHIEVA after business hours. Call during our business hours"

They were closed Friday, Saturday, and Sunday for Easter.!!!

No code for you!

So I closed the app.

When I reopened it on Monday, everything had disappeared. Payers, payments...

SHAME ON YOU ACHIEVA.

Today's award goes to LOAN DEPOT.

I don't even know who they are or how they got my personal data, but they just wrote to me to inform me that they had been hacked, and that they lost my:
Name
Address
Email address
Financial Account Numbers
Social Security Number
Phone Number
Date of birth

Mind you they:
"promptly took steps...
"launched an investigation...
"offered me free credit monitoring...

The usual bu****it.

They followed with 3 pages of things I should do!

Seriously?

NEWREZ Mortgage:

A few months ago I was informed that my mortgage with Caliber was going to be serviced by their parent company, Newrez.

Big deal, I thought. OK.

Until my home insurance agent called to alert me that the escrowed flood insurance payment had not been made, and I risked losing my property coverage, which, in Florida, is tantamount to 'time to pack up and leave'.

We spoke with Newrez who assured us it was in process, even though it was already past due.

My agent suggested I pay for the flood insurance directly, even though it would be a duplicate payment. Which I did.

Newrez kept insisting they were on top of it, but even their local rep wasn't buying it.

A month later, Newrez said their check had been returned because payment had already been received. So I asked for my money back.

Oh no! They had to order a full escrow analysis, which would take two weeks, before they would agree to that.

A month later, I received a smaller, partial refund after their thorough analysis showed that my current escrow would not cover the required premium.

I was too tired and fed up with them to argue, so I deposited their check and forgot about it.

TODAY, I received a statement from Newrez, advising me that my monthly escrow is being increased in order to meet the amount stipulated by their 'escrow analysis'.

So... Newrez lied about sending out the money to the insurance company. They jeopardized my property insurance coverage. They played with my funds for 3 months, and they screwed up their escrow analysis...

SHAME ON YOU, NEWREZ!!!

WOW Internet

Just switched from Frontier due to their abysmal customer service.

I now get a letter from WOW. Past due, with fines.

I'm on Direct Autopay, so I call.

They ask for name, address, pin, last 4 of SS, phone... I think we're good to go, but they now want amount of last payment I made.

I say "I don't know, because I'm on Autopay and you say I didn't pay."

Silence. Panic. Confusion...

Then disconnect.

I called back and eventually got all fees reversed, including a new 'service plan' charge they had sneaked in there.

SHAME ON YOU, WOW!