March 12, 2008

Quick Note To OUR Credit Union

Saturday, 17 Priming 2008

OUR Credit Union has also recently had its' name changed from the Royal Oak Community Credit Union, and their online prescence can be found here in case you'd like to ask them yourself about their business policies and practices with regard to the events and policies discussed here.

So, credit union people: when one of your customers comes into a branch office to cash a Western Union money order, it would be best if you didn't assume that they were some sort of criminal trying to pass off some counterfeit paper, and treat them like you're going to arrest them because the money order can't be verified by Western Union's automated system. Even if they look like a somewhat more respectable version of your basic long haired DFH* coming in to the credit union during their lunch break. And you don't immediately recognize them - mainly because they do most of their business with you online, and so don't generally visit the business units much.

Funny story about this situation (and a quick note to Western Union while I'm at it):

The customer 'service' representative at the the credit union (and the manager at the time), once they looked me over, subjected the money order in question to chemical testing to make sure that my counterfeit operation was using the finest materials, humiliated me in front of the other customers there, and repeatedly called the Western Union automated 'service' to be repeatedly told by their software that the money order in question hadn't been registered by the system, they managed to be civil enough to give it back to me and not call the boys in blue to haul my a$$ off to jail.

I then made my own attempts to contact Western Union and find out what the frell was going on. My first attempt got the same software telling me that the money order I was holding in my hand didn't exist in their records. Then, the first customer 'service' representative I talked to told me the same thing, refused to look into the situation any further, and, when I asked to speak to a supervisor once they refused to help me any more, hung up on me. The second customer 'service' rep wouldn't directly pass me on to a manager unless I told him what I was calling about. As soon as I said I was trying to talk to a supervisor about the lack of professional courtesy being exhibited by Western Union's customer 'service' people, I was put through.

It was almost like dealing with a completely different company. "I'm sorry sir - yes, that was unprofessional of them. Yes, I will pass your complaint along to the management responsible for promoting an environment that causes the peons to act this way**." I could smell the bovine excrement exuding from this corpo-weasel on the other side of the world while sitting in front of my PC at home. But, in the end, this individual was actually able to shed some light on the situation.

It seems that, for the most part, when you buy a money order from a Western Union agent, that agent is supposed to report the details of the money order to Western Union, so that they can update their database and verify the details to the businesses that cash it. The agents are supposed to do that within 48 hours of selling the money order.

Well, according to this Western Union manager, this particular agent at this particular outlet holds on to their transmissions for a week and then sends the bundled transaction information to Western Union once a week. So, if I can just be a little more patient and stop expecting companies to do what they say they're going to do when they say they're going to do it, everything will work out just fine.

Funny how the manager at the credit union couldn't get past the automated messages telling him that the money order doesn't exist in the Western Union database, like I did with a few phone calls. Funny how the default position for both of these business organizations was to assume that everyone involved (except them) was engaging in criminal activity, and treat them accordingly. And funny that I had to raise a big stink just to find out that some of the businesses involved were not behaving in the businesslike manner that they had legally agreed to.

I hope the credit union is equally amused (bemused?) when a long time customer of theirs takes their business elsewhere because of their corporate policies.

Update: Amazingly (cough), the missing money order data has magically appeared in Western Union's database within 24 hours of my inquiries. why, it's almost like their might have been some legally actionable avenues I might have been able to pursue if they hadn't gotten their act together post haste!

For some strange reason, this has not restored my confidence with regards to future business dealings with these organiztions...

* - Dirty Fcuking Hippie

** - and then he promised me a pony and a winning lottery ticket - so I quit my job in anticipation of the fabulous wealth I had just been promised by a complete stranger in frelling India. Not that I'm saying that I can't trust businesses when they promise to follow their own corporate policies, or anything lilke that...

Posted by (: Tom :) at March 12, 2008 05:24 AM