Chronicle of a typical Chase loan mod saga

This family has been trying for over two years to get some help on their mortgage, due to legitimate hardships – a job loss and medical issues.  They started with WaMu, which did not go well, and continued the process with Chase, which also did not go well.

When they called in May 2009 to check on their application, they were told their case had been closed when Washington Mutual was bought by JPMorgan Chase and that they would have to apply again.

In the meantime, they received notice in August that their home was in foreclosure proceedings.

They applied again and were asked to submit additional information. When they received a call on Sept. 17, 2009, telling them that their modification had been approved, the couple thought their troubles had come to an end. They were given the terms over the phone.

“I cried that day,” Marianne Sevy said. “I told (the Chase representative) I loved him.”

The representative told her that the papers would be delivered and that they should put a signed note on their door so it could be dropped off if no one was home.

The papers never came.

They said each time they called Chase over the next nine months, they ended up speaking to a different person, none of whom could tell them why.

Joe Baldi, a housing counselor at the Frederick Community Action Agency who is working with the couple on a last-ditch effort to avoid foreclosure, said their situation is not uncommon.

“This is a classic problem we have,” Baldi said. “It’s like some sort of horrible game that just goes on and on. Once a loan starts unraveling, it just goes berserk.”

Collection calls began in June, asking them how they were going to handle the foreclosure. When they told the representative that they had an approved modification, she informed them that none was on record.

An underwriter had sat on the agreement and it expired, Marianne Sevy said she later found out.

“I was floored, and the woman was extremely rude and obnoxious,” she said. “She had me so upset I was screaming on the phone.”

Do our Senators and Representatives in Congress know about stories like these, which are more common than not with people applying for loan modifications?  Sure, the loan modification success numbers are pitiful, but it is the process that is truly pathetic and needs addressing.

Chase won’t take no for an answer, keeps harassing customers

We’ve heard this from several Chase customers, and this is another report of the same behavior.

I have been inundated with phone calls, bothersome requests for my time on bank visits, and mailings regarding “how my debit card works” from Chase bank over the past few months. Now, as near as I can tell, all they needed to know from the outset was whether or not I wanted to take advantage of their offer for Chase Overdraft Coverage for which you have made several postings already – however, just so we’re clear, I will copy and paste the options from their website:

“Select “Yes” if you want Chase to authorize and pay overdrafts on your everyday debit card transactions. Your everyday debit card purchases may be approved at Chase’s discretion, when you don’t have sufficient available funds. Standard overdraft fees may apply. Note: By choosing “Yes,” your account(s) will reflect your decision effective immediately.

Select “No” if you do not want Chase to authorize and pay overdrafts on your everyday debit card transactions. Your everyday debit card purchases will be declined if you don’t have sufficient funds. Accordingly, you will not be charged insufficient funds/overdraft fees for everyday debit card transactions. Note: By choosing “No,” your account(s) will reflect your decision on or before the second business day after your decision has been submitted.”

Simply put, this reads to me “Are you authorizing us (Chase Bank) to allow you to overdraw your account and thus charge you an overdraft fee, or would you prefer we decline your card in the event you don’t have enough money to pay for a purchase?”

No-brainer, right? No, I would not like you to allow me to spend money I don’t have and charge me even more money that I don’t have for the privilege of being allowed to make this purchase.

Problem is, I have declined this outright several times – both online and in person, and yet I am still being harangued every time I interact with my bank.

Why Chase loves Hispanic customers

Chase recently touted that it 400,000 customers have signed up to received their statements in Spanish and lists its bevy of customer services that are offered in Spanish in a recent press release.  Presumably they are doing this to attract more Hispanic customers.  At first glance, it seems admirable that Chase is trying to better serve a demographic which is traditionally under served and may not have access to the same services that others have, leaving them at a disadvantage.

But I’ve gotten used to questioning the motive of anything Chase does, given the many many Chase horror stories I have seen.

In this case, I can’t help but think that customers who speak only Spanish would be less likely to seek justice when dealing with problems or mistreatment they might encounter with Chase.  I don’t think this is inherent to Spanish-only speaking people, but to anyone who finds themselves in a country where they don’t speak the predominantly spoken and written language.

So why do I question Chase’s motives in this case?  Chase’s press release leaves out mention of some very important services such as bilingual ATM’s and bilingual online banking.  Surely they would mention those in a press release if they were offered.  ATM’s at least seem fairly essential to banking and not understanding what the ATM is telling you would be difficult, especially when there is a problem.  Also, while they do mention in in the press release that they offer bilingual services in their branches, they way they says absolutely nothing about how many branches.  It could be in only two branches out of thousands.

This isn’t such a strange concept for a bank like Chase.  If they are willing to stack the deck in certain ways against their banking customers (automatic overdraft protection, selective order if debit/credit application) and their credit card customers (moving due dates, preemptive rate increases) why wouldn’t they do the same thing to customers whose primary language wasn’t English by excluding some essential services from those that are offered bilingually?

Chase claims a lot more foreclosures coming

As you walk down the trecherous road to trying to get a loan modification with Chase Bank, and you begin to wonder what their motivations truly are, keep this in mind:

Charlie Scharf, JP Morgan Chase’s head of retail financial services, told investors recently to expect REO (Real Estate Owned) sales to make up a substantial part of overall real estate sales over the next two years, from 21 to 28 percent.  He certainly must know something about Chase’s mortgage business which presumably figures into his statement and might be taken as admitting that Chase doesn’t see itself stemming the wave of foreclosures anytime soon.

Chase’s full-page WSJ ad vs the truth

Chase plastered a page of the Wall Street Journal with a full-page ad today touting its success in providing loan modifications.  The true story however is far from the limited picture the full-page ad provides.

In the ad, Chase touts its opening of 51 home ownership centers and the fact that they have “offered” 750,000 loan modifications to homeowners.

The reality is quite a bit less flattering than the ad.  Of those 750,000 modifications Chase has offered, how many of them were so ridiculously ineffective that the homeowner could only decline, like one that offered a sum total of 22 cents in reduced monthly mortgage payment?  Of those that were accepted, how many of them were made permanent, a much better measure of the effectiveness of their program.  As of May, Chase had made about 47,000 loan modifications permanent, which amounts to about 6% of the total they have “offered.”

What about the success of the permanent modifications?  According to a Bloomberg article, about half of all permanent modifications make their way to default again.

So what is the bottom line?  Of the 750,000 loan modifications Chase claims to have “offered”, about 3% of them will end up being effective.  Not much to brag about really.  As to those home ownership centers, how useful can they be if they aren’t helping people stay in their homes?

Now Chase employees can rate Chase

We’ve recently pointed out that Chase got an F rating with the BBB, ratings site Amplicate has 86% of people voters hating Chase, and mybanktracker.com has people giving Chase a one star out of 5 rating.

What could possible complete this bevy of ratings you ask?  How about the employer opinion site JobVent’s Chase ratings, from an employee perspective?

Yea, you guessed it, employees don’t seem to be all that fond of Chase either.

More Chase insiders speak

If you can get past the run-on sentences, misspellings, and generally poor writing, you will get a sense from this recent post by someone that claims to be a Chase insider, that working for Chase is not fun.

Cross-account debt payment a new trend for Chase?

Here is something Chase apparently did that is really pushing the edges of ethics and legality.

Yes we have been late on payments to the point when my husband had to give Chase our checking account number to make a payment.

So far so good, the customer agreed to allow Chase a one time EFT from their checking account to satisfy a late credit card payment.  But then Chase took the next unethical and probably illegal step and kept taking money out of the checking account, when they were not authorized to do so.

Ever since then, which was 6 months ago, Chase has been automatically taking payments out of our checking account without our authorization and us knowing about the transaction. Because of these incidents our family has suffered from lack of food in our house, care for our child, and medical/dental treatment.

This fits right in with the many documented cases of Chase debiting peoples accounts to satisfy what may or may not be a valid old debt, without informing the customer as to why or that the debit even happened.  This has even caused people to unknowingly rack up overdraft charges.

So far, the stories we’ve seen have been limited to old debt that was seemingly charged off and forgotten by the customer, but apparently not by Chase.  This story represents a new trend where Chase is willing to bend, possibly break the rules for current debt that is still in relatively current form.

This begs the question of how far Chase is willing to go to gets its payment.  If you’ve EVER paid your credit card by authorizing an EFT from your checking account at a non-Chase bank, will they now start debiting your checking account if your payment is even a day late?  What if you have never authorized a payment from another account but you have a checking, savings, or investment account also at Chase?  Will they start taking funds from ANY account they have access to to satisfy current debt that they feel might be in danger?

I would not be surprised if stories just like these scenarios break in the next few months.