Door Locked until further notice First Bank and now Credit Union

[fried1765]

If you buy a lot on Amazon there on credit cards gets you 5% back on Amazon. It is done through Chase.

Aaron Z

I buy very little on Amazon, it just so happened they had this leather seat bottom cover at the best price.
I do buy most everything on the internet though.
Frequently E-Bay (often cheaper, and faster shipping).
I refuse to get sucked into paying for Amazon Prime!

 

[Diggin It]

3% without Prime, 5% with.

 

[fried1765]

3% without Prime, 5% with.

To make up that 2% difference with Prime ($119 per yr.) I would need to spend $6,000 per year with Amazon
I doubt if I spend $800 per yr. with Amazon, on average.
E-Bay sellers, and other online sellers, get most of my dollars.
The BofA card gives 3% back on E-Bay, Amazon, and ALL online sales.
All...being the operative word.

In my opinion: Prime is the equivalent of cut bait, used to hook buyers into buying only from Amazon.

Don't get me wrong: I detest BofA, but I will use them when it is to my advantage.

 

[LittleBill21]

To make up that 2% difference with Prime ($119 per yr.) I would need to spend $6,000 per year with Amazon
I doubt if I spend $800 per yr. with Amazon, on average.
E-Bay sellers, and other online sellers, get most of my dollars.
The BofA card gives 3% back on E-Bay, Amazon, and ALL online sales.
All...being the operative word.

it actually gives 5.25% back if you have 100k with them in a brokerage account like merrill

 

[Dftodd]

All true but technology isn't a panacea... just look at all the trouble Dragoneggs is having with his computerized gas furnace... my key in floor furnace has never failed... light match, open valve, warmth.

A couple of thoughts…

Drive through would be fine... not a problem... in fact I was surprised that most banks had them in Washington State and with nice canopies... you know it rains a lot. Just have not seen one here in forever...

Maybe I am dated... but the reason I avoided ATM/Debit Cards is there is no limit on liability for fraud as there is the $50 for Credit Cards plus I can contest Credit Card Charges and not pay that portion under dispute.

Lots of people around here are in the Gig economy... they don't have checks, credit/debit cards and they don't have ATM... they use Zelle, Venmo, PayPal and think nothing of paying a convenience fee...

More than a few times a cancelled check has saved my butt... I paid an insurance premium and then there was a loss... the claim denied as their was no policy... funny thing... producing a cancelled check change all that.

I still have tenants that pay in cash... especially the students that are renting one house... there are 4... cash or money order... none have checking accounts and I am not going to track 4 separate payments... that said they are very good and the neighborhood was rough for a very long time... but the rental is clean and well kept and a bargain by Bay Area standards.

Not arguing... maybe it is time for me to be put out to pasture... more tractor time anyway and time to polish up some of the antique cars as the world continues on...

Wait a minute my favorite tractors are 50 to 60 years old too!



I

Atm/ debit cards have the same protection as a credit card with my bank. I've had fraudulent charges on my account. Went in, disputed the charges and the money was returned to my account within 7 days.

I write 4 to 8 checks a year. The 4 definite are the quarterly pesticide spraying in my home. I leave a check on the counter for when he stops by.

They call and schedule a few days in advance and I made arrangements with the tech that comes out on where the key is. It's the been same guy for the past 10 years.

The rest of the checks are usually doctor bills.

My normal bills are paid online.

 

[Dftodd]

Well, it was Alltel. a regional company, mostly in southern states, but yeah same idea. But we hadn't owned a phone or house wiring for a Loooong time. We would fix house wiring for I think it was about a 3 dollar a month fee. pretty silly huh? But old people payed it. Even then our line count was getting smaller and smaller every month. People migrating to smart phones. At that time we had the cell phone franchise too. So that was all good. Then the company was broken up and looted and sold the cell phone business to Verizon, and we were called Windstream and retained the dying land line business. Oh, boy, wasn't that great. The rest is history. All of it downhill.

I'm one of their customers It's ok, but all I have is internet through them. I can't complain though. I got locked into a special program when they turned the fiber on in the area since I was an existing customer. I got the 50mbps speed for the same price I was paying for the 1 to 3 mbps speed.

Renter next door has the same download speed, but his bill is about double what I pay.

Sudden Link just ran a cable network through the area. Thought about switching but then they had a 7 on your side story with some big horror stories about them.

Wasn't really impressed with their subcontractors that installed the lines either. I ended up moving their truck out of the road after looking for them for about 5 minutes, so residents including myself could get to our homes with our vehicles. Then my shepherd went after one of them when one of them started being an a## to my wife Dude levitated into the back of his truck :laughing: Wife walked by telling Gypsy she was a good girl :cool2:

 

[grsthegreat]

My one experience with Bank of Awfulness was when they tried to charge me a fee to cash a business check drawn from the very same branch I was in.

Never again.

I can top that..BofA once tried to put a 3 day wait on my cash deposit. That was in 1996, and I closed my accounts right then and there. Never darkened their doorway again.

 

[California]

Re Amazon Prime I would never pay for that but it was a free bonus with a 5-subscriber Metro-PCS phone account. I rounded up family and put them on my plan, I'm the Daddy.

$150 total monthly for free Prime shipping and five phone lines.

Now with Covid-19 we're getting Amazon packages a few times a week. The first one recently was a 30-roll carton of TP.

 

[California]

I can top that..BofA once tried to put a 3 day wait on my cash deposit. That was in 1996, and I closed my accounts right then and there.

Dunno if I can top it but this might match it. Around 2005 Mom at her 95th birthday asked me to take over managing her simple finances after her Wells Fargo MC 'didn't look right'. They had added a $65/ month 'Credit Protection Plan', apparently the same service as any credit card has. And never told her.

Then I discovered a second $65/month, on a card she had never requested that was billed alternate weeks from her known card. She had been paying both bills for a few months.

I think that practice is one of the specific things WF ended up paying the $Billion fines for, recently.


Dad's affairs similar. In his final couple of years he had put in $1k to open a WF checking account, just to get the local signature guarantees he needed to do brokerage stuff. As Trustee resolving his Trust, WF required me to send originals of the death certificate to close the account. I twice filled out all the papers and sent them off to their branch in Oregon that is designated to rip of widows and orphans. Never heard any reply at all. I finally wrote a check on the account for most of the balance, then before the next statement wrote a final check for the final pennies and cashed it at the bank in person. Then ignored the blizzard of 'Low Balance Fee' junk they kept sending.

Buncha vultures.

My experience with our Fidelity Investments credit card and checking is day/night better than WF.

 

[RickB]

To make up that 2% difference with Prime ($119 per yr.) I would need to spend $6,000 per year with Amazon
I doubt if I spend $800 per yr. with Amazon, on average.
E-Bay sellers, and other online sellers, get most of my dollars.
The BofA card gives 3% back on E-Bay, Amazon, and ALL online sales.
All...being the operative word.

In my opinion: Prime is the equivalent of cut bait, used to hook buyers into buying only from Amazon.

Don't get me wrong: I detest BofA, but I will use them when it is to my advantage.

There are benefits to Prime beyond the shipping hook. We take advantage of some and are satisfied Prime members.