1. Amex Plat and JPM -- Always professional, courteous and well spoken. These CSRs seem to have a better ability to understand more complex and spatial issues; and, then resolve them efficiently.
2. Discover -- Always received excellent customer service, though I sense the above Amex/JPM CSRs were more articulate and appeared to better suited to understanding more complex issues (euphemistic way to say I thought the Amex/JPM CSRs were smarter).
3. Chase/US Bank -- Calls were always handled courteously and efficiently.
4. Barlclay/Citi -- Unspectacular, at best.
5. BofA/CapOne/HSBC et al. -- Ah, makes me wish phones had never been invented.
PS - HSBC int'l is exemplary.