First Financial Fucked Fez

I’m currently in a much better mood, given that my issues with my bank are long from being solved. What happened was on Tuesday the 19th, I was online using my bank’s (First Financial) bill payment system to pay my NIPSCO bill (rehashing the end of this post), and I made a gross over-payment (like $2300 gross).

So I can deal with making mistakes, how use would I learn but the bill payment system didn’t give me a confirmation screen to verify my numbers and by the time I got any notice it was too late to do anything. The frustrating part was I didn’t have $2300 in my checking account to cover a payment that big yet it still clear. Also, my NIPSCO bill wasn’t anywhere near $2300 and they wanted to act like I was trying to steal from them when I asked for a refund. I literally had to bend over backwards, while blowing the CEO of NiSource and juggle 5 bowling pins to just so they could call my bank to see whether or not the payment would clear the bank. So after being told by my bank that with the bill payment systems, all funds are cleared regardless of balance (red flag), 5 minutes later they told NIPSCO that funds didn’t clear my checking account and the gas company denied my refund claim.

It seemed that everyday there was something new that would turn me into a ranting and raving lunatic, plotting and scheming, planning on doing some shit that might have me doing a stint in jail. If it wasn’t for my mother calling me everyday, this entry would be coming straight from Lake County Corrections.

So after a week and half of callbacks, threats of litigation, a couple F-bombs and a few CSRs called bitches, the fix is in-motion. Of course I have to wait 2-3 weeks for a check from NIPSCO, and I can’t go open another check account becasue I’m now in Chex Systems, I’m feeling better.

3 Comments

Hi,

Long time no hear. I been there before, but I have to ask, when you did the bill payment, was it effective that exact day or a day or two later? If that was the case, you could have the bank demand that their vendor stop payment on that check and your account wouldn’t have been touched. You can also tell your bank that they are missing audit controls to protect against loss, which could have occurred to you and the bank.

The bank can do much more than to say “I’m sorry”. You have to break their back and get in their face because banks, many times, can careless about a retail client. That is the main reason why I hate doing business with large banks, even though I am working for one now.

Nipsco? I can’t stand them!

As a quick tip- always file a BBB complaint when dealing with these companies. They regard their BBB ratings and complaints are always monitored by a special manager or a V.P. You will always get faster results when a BBB complaint is filed…go online and do one. I suggest you do one on each company and then say you will report them to financial regulation commission.

I intentions was to schedule the payment for the 29th of September but it went through on the 19th. I did try to get a stop-payment but because the bill payment system is all electronic, the bank couldn’t do a stop-payment.

Essentially to get everything settle, I had to get off the found and go to a brnach in sit in someone’s face. Because like you said, everyone I talked to in phone support is located in a office where customers can’t access them.

My resolve is to switch to a bank with better online protocols. And don’t stress about working for a big bank, think of it as ‘bring THE MAN down frm within.’ LOL

That’s what I do for a living, electronic banking software development.

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