Rage Against the Machines
I’ll be the first to admit that I have a rather tumultuous, love-hate relationship…with Chase Bank. I adore the nine kajillion ATMs blanketing the city, I really do, but sometimes, their customer service leaves me a bit cold. Recently, I was fiddling around with my online account in an ultimately futile attempt at establishing a recurring electronic payment, and I finally decided to admit defeat and call Customer Service. The bubbly representative gave her little how-can-I-provide-you-with-absolutely-mind-blowing-service-today intro, and I asked if it might be possible for her to set up an electronic, rather than snail mail, payment on my account. “Oh, no,” she responded, “The computer decides that.” And she was totally serious. Apparently, it was impossible–unthinkable even–for anyone at Chase Bank to override the computer’s “decision,” which is a little unsettling, if you ask me. I mean, we’ve all seen the Terminator Trilogy. Where does this madness end?
Shhh… you can’t hate on the machine in public. The machine is everywhere. It hears everything. Beware the machine. But seriously, yeah; it’s annoying that their managers tell them to never attempt to think outside the box or contend the computer’s ‘NO’. Forget common sense, or simple requests, if the computer says ‘NO’, who is the minimum-wage-paid-employee to disagree?
Don’t answer, ‘the computer decides that’ too.
Yeah, it is pretty damn annoy–wait…I think my computer is listening in. I better look busy and act happy.
The unfortunate truth is that most of the customer service agents working for Chase (as well as most large [multi-]national corporations including such lovelies as AT&T, Comcast, etc) couldn’t operate their microwave to make popcorn if it didn’t have a quickset button that said "popcorn" on it.
It is actually possible to set up electronic payments with Chase, but you can’t go through their normal customer service to do so. It’s a rather belabored and overcomplicated process, but you have to dig around in the online preferences, tweak some settings, and then call their technical support (not customer support).
Good luck!
Recent update: I was told that after the 15th of this month, the computer will be granting permission to its customers set up electronic payments. I’m not going to question it. The date’s marked on my calendar, and my fingers are crossed.
(And Chase has technical support? Unbelievable…)