Is \”change\” coming to Wells Fargo Bank?
I\’m in Henderson, Nevada at Green Valley Ranch preparing to speech at James Malinchak\’s Millionaire Success Secrets event.
The topic for my talk is \”How to Get Google to Send You Money\”, which is about making money with AdSense.
As part of my AdSense presentation, I use $50 – $75 in pennies to illustrate how little clicks add up to real money.
So every time I visit a new town to do my presentation, I need to locate two props… up to $75 in pennies and a clear fish bowl, jar or vase to pour them in.
Usually someone at the hotel\’s finance department will aid in acquiring the pennies I need. We call ahead and they bill us for the pennies when we arrive.
Most times the venue will also have a container I can use to dump the pennies into. One time I broke a vase even though I promised I wouldn\’t. The thing shattered into a hundred pieces. Oops.
Anyhow, Green Valley Ranch was not helpful with the pennies, so I sent my VP of Sales, Joey Montez, out to find a bank and exchange my green currency for tons of little coins.
Joey came back to the hotel over an hour later, exasperated and beaten by the Vegas heat. (It\’s brutal here… I don\’t know why anyone would voluntarily choose to live in the desert.)
He explained that he took a cab to the Wells Fargo Bank at 900 N Green Valley Pkwy in Henderson. It was about a mile or so from the hotel.
He asked the teller if he could exchange currency for a few bricks of pennies.
From the back of the teller area another teller yelled out, \”Do you have an account with us?\”
Joey responded \”I am a prospect!\”
Apparently she didn\’t hear him and walked back to the vault to get the pennies.
Joey waited patiently while the meter for the cab was running. The teller knew he was in a hurry, but it seemed like she was taking her sweet time.
She finally came back and stacked the bricks of pennies on the counter. She then asked again, \”Do you have an account with us?\”
Joey said, \”You know, I can look into getting an account with you guys, but right now I just need to exchange the cash for pennies.\”
The stack of pennies was on the counter right in front of Joey.
The teller replied, \”Sorry we don\’t do that. It\’s only for our merchants.\”
Joey is waving the cash right in front of her and she couldn\’t care less. He was asking if he needed to open an account to get the pennies and she replied that it was a minimum of $100 to open the account.
He told me that they were clearly giving him \”attitude\” because he wasn\’t a customer. He felt like they weren\’t taking him seriously. He felt humiliated by the teller.
At that point, he left the bank.
Joey walked across the street to U.S. Bank at 1000 North Green Valley Parkway and made the same request.
The tellers were extremely helpful and kind, going from drawer to drawer and to the safe to find the $75 in pennies requested.
No qualms. No attitude. No fees. They acted like they actually wanted to help.
When Joey told me this story I suggested we pay a visit to the manager at Wells Fargo.
We needed to go back out to get something anyhow, so I thought we\’d throw in an extra stop. I wanted to share my thoughts and feelings with the teller with attitude.
We arrived at the bank and asked the cab driver to wait. It wouldn\’t take long.
The manager was out to lunch, but the greeter pointed us to the assistant manager. It just happened to be the teller that was so unhelpful!
I calmly and kindly smiled and introduced myself. I\’m standing in shorts, t-shirt and flip flops, so I\’m sure the teller placed judgment on me.
I told her I run a number of businesses out of Northern Colorado and there happens to be a Wells Fargo Bank in my town.
I also told her that while I am not a customer, Wells Fargo has been on my radar.
I then proceeded to explain my problem with their bank not being able to service a simple request to exchange currency because I am not a current customer.
She was clearly not happy to see me, but she calmly replied that their system will not let them do an exchange without a customer account number. And apparently they sometimes charge their own customers a fee to exchange currency!
My mind went to a commercial spoof that Saturday Night Live did many years ago called \”First CityWide Change Bank\”.
Here was a spoof on a bank that did nothing but make change and I couldn\’t get a so-called REAL bank to make change! The irony was amazing.
I proceeded to speak with the teller and suggested that the policy was not a very good way to turn a prospect into a customer.
She told me that she couldn\’t comment on bank policy and that she didn\’t have any control over it.
She was nice, but I am going to take Joey\’s word that he was treated unkindly.
We left the bank content that a statement was made.
The final word on that statement is to the CEO of Wells Fargo Bank.
Why in the world would you charge your own customers to exchange currency? Shouldn\’t that just be a value-added service?
And why wouldn\’t you seek to exchange currency from a non-customer? Here\’s a basic rule of business. When you treat the prospect like a customer they are more likely to become a customer. And besides, it\’s not like you are losing any money.
But you have lost any and all hope of EVER having me as a customer, Wells Fargo.
And I am certain that every time I drive by the Wells Fargo brand on Highway 34 in Loveland, Colorado, this story will come to mind. I will remember the bank that would not make change.
Oh, and to the nice tellers at U.S. Bank in Henderson. Thank you for being decent human beings and helping us out.
Let the pennies flow!