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Carol H Tucker
Passionate about knowledge management and organizational development, expert in loan servicing, virtual world denizen and community facilitator, and a DISNEY fan
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beladona Memorial
Be warned:in this very rich environment where you can immerse yourself so completely, your emotions will become engaged -- and not everyone is cognizant of that. Among the many excellent features of SL, there is no auto-return on hearts, so be wary of where your's wanders...
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left holding the bag...
I have been following the story about the fraudulent accounts since it first broke and my first reaction was to pinpoint the insane pressure for cross-selling that must’ve existed because I have worked at several banks and I know just how much they push the line staff [the tellers and the customer service reps, whatever titles they are given] to sell. It is a fact that the more products a customer uses in your bank, the less likely they are to up and move to another bank [or credit union], and of course, the fee income looks really good on the balance sheet. As a result, the number of products is obsessively examined and the goal is to have every borrower to have at least three of more. Now I guarantee you that the line personnel didn’t start out just opening fraudulent accounts, but kinda stumbled into the problems. A couple products are relatively easy to cross-sell – for example, checking is what brings them in the door, and you can usually try to sell overdraft protection and then bill-pay with the online banking but not everyone wants these products! So you start giving them to customers as a “feature” – at first they are free, but after about six months, the fees start to be assessed and usually they are just low enough that most customers won’t complain.
But then your “action plan” gets reviewed at the end of the quarter, and you are put on probation because you haven’t met your goals, and you get worried because you have watched others lose their jobs for this reason and you know the market for employment is tough. So you come up with a way to “help” the customers [and yourself] who have a lot of funds just sitting in a CD or Money Market account, and you move those funds to another account so they can get a higher rate of interest – that works and if anyone asks you a question about it? It is for the benefit of the customer, you proclaim, no harm no foul. And you’d be surprised how few people actually LOOK at their monthly bank statements, how few will even notice the changes….. No penalty, no realization that what you just did was fraudulent or wrong, just a feeling of shaky relief that you managed to keep your job.
Then the auditors/examiners/regulators suddenly ask for documentation and write up that accounts have been opened without customers’ knowledge or permission. Senior management is shocked [SHOCKED I tell you] to learn such things have been happening. And those stuffed shirts who have been raking in huge bonuses based on fee income and new accounts, the same ones who put in place unrealistic expectations of sales goals, fire you because it is all your fault. THEY get to keep their jobs and pay, you are labeled a criminal and good luck trying to find another job in any financial services organization.
To my surprise, my tweet aboutthe class action suit filed by employees fired by Wells Fargo for not meeting the aggressive sales goals has been liked and re-tweeted more than any other post that I have ever made in social media on any platform. Maybe others see the stuffed shirts getting away with the booty while leaving the line staff holding the bag, and hope that somehow senior management will be held accountable.
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