I'm very unhappy with the customer service at Matthews. If those funds were not doing so well going back for so many years, I'd be out of them and into something else in a flash. I had an account in my own name. I got married. I wanted to add my wife's name. They did. But it would be too simple to do just THAT. No, my original account had to be cashed out and a whole new account created with both names. Only, this joint account is a bigger pain in the ass than it's worth. Everywhere else I go, with a JTWROS assignation, EITHER or BOTH parties can do anything and everything with a portion, or with ALL of the account's proceeds.
I've gone around and around about this with them: In my entire life's experience with joint accounts--- here, there and everywhere---ONLY Matthews requires that BOTH parties sign checks to us from Matthews. So we both have to rearrange our day, in order to be at the bank at the same time or follow the other one around all day. It's useless, needless and pointless.
I KNOW there is a way to avoid doing this. I am aware that one option is to register the account with "OR" as opposed to "AND." (As in John Smith OR Jane Smith.) But the F****** SUPERVISOR told me that what they are currently requiring is the ONLY way they are permitted to handle things. There is no other way to treat the checks they send to us. Both signatures are required. BOTH of us must give the check DOUBLE the attention the thing deserves to do simple, ordinary stuff with it: cash the item, or deposit it in our bank account.
Obviously, they're not telling me something. They've not told me everything. But no one at that end will ever SAY that.....Reminds me of the time I pushed and pushed and pushed with a credit card company. I used to hold their card, and I was asking a question. The agent could not answer me. The Supervisor could not answer me. The Supervisor's supervisor finally got on the line to me, and after 20 MORE minutes of futile bullshit, with them all stonewalling me--- he finally told me: "That information is proprietary." I laughed so hard. Then I made it clear how utterly stupid, foolish and futile all of this wasted time had been. I finished with: "Oh! So you just don't WANT to tell me that information. Why didn't you give me that vapid, canned, idiotic response 45 minutes ago, and we could all go about our business?"
Ya........ And then the Matthews woman had the spleen to condescendingly offer an option to me whereby neither of us would have to worry about it, ever again: give Matthews our BANK information so that the funds can be deposited electronically....Which is beside the point and doesn't address the reason I called them about this crap. Even my own denomination is starting to REQUIRE electronic transfer of funds in March of '12 in order for all of us to receive our pension checks. Welcome to The Machine, boys and girls. (Apologies to Pink Floyd.)
Comments
Of course, next question is if they'll let you add ACH to an existing account without a stupid medallion signature guarantee. If they require that, just close your existing account and open a new one with the ACH instructions - or transfer shares to a Fido account, but that will be an even bigger hassle starting from where you are now.