Dumb & Dumber: Bank of New York Mellon

Apropos of nothing at all, I thought you might be amused about a recent correspondence from BNY Mellon Shareowner Services. They wrote to request that we verify our "new" address at 67 Edgewood, et al. Their prior address for us, apparently didn't work any more (5631 Knollwood et al, in Bethesda). Think of that, it's only been 9 years since we left that address. That pesky post office really needs to continue forwarding for at least ten years, don't you think?

But to continue, they asked me to update their records, otherwise we might be listed as a "lost shareholder." Wouldn't want that now, would we? So, I tried logging on to their web site, but of course, I didn't have a pin number to sign on and, after three tries to establish one, I gave up and decided to call them.

So, I called. I finally got to speak with someone and after a fairly brief conversation, she told me that I needed to call a different number, since I was dealing with Alcatel-Lucent (I knew that all along).

So, I called the second number and after explaining that I was calling about a change of address, one that had occurred 9 years ago, I was just wondering . . . what this was all about. I mean, how much potentially lost stock were we talking about?

Well, guess what? We are talking about a zero balance account.

"Excuse me? You wrote to me, using up a $0.42 stamp, asked me to log onto your web site, and then requiring me to call you twice to verify an address change on a ten year old residence change, all for no money, as in zero balance?? Why would you do such a thing?

"Well, I'm sorry sir, but even after accounts are closed, we try to keep track of addressees"

"Uh, why?"

"I don't know sir. Can I help you with anything else sir?"

"Uh, no, I guess not."

And people (generally Republican people) wonder why the Government is so inefficient.

Gee, think our government could possibly be any dumber than BNY Mellon?

 And now, the postscript:

We just received in the mail from the Bank of New York, Mellon, a check for $0.05. Yes, you read that correctly. The Bank of NY Mellon sent us a check for FIVE CENTS.

And how much is the Bank of New York Mellon slated to receive from the federal Bailout Fund?  Couldn’t let guys like this go bankrupt, now could we?

Oh, oh, I know, maybe this is our share of the Republican tax cuts.