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Disappointed with Alliant

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Green456
Established Contributor

Disappointed with Alliant

So few months back I was on my vaccation in Europe. I notified Alliant of my trip. While on the trip I set up a transfer to external account. They blocked the transfer, suspended my accout and deleted the external bank. A little bit excessive but one can still find this an acceptable action, especially that they tried to reach me via phone. Now my disappointment is that, they do have 24 hour service and when I called them first time, they claimed that I cannot log into my account because of system maintance and did not mention anything about my account being suspended. The 2nd phone call, 2 days later after they were done with their mainance, I was told that my account was suspended but they cannot help me because I have to wait until regular hours. What's the point of having 24 hours banking then??? I finally did wait until regular eastern time, I called again and was told that the person who handles fraud is at a meeting and unavialble. So 6th largest credit union in the country has only 1 person that can unlock my account? I finally managed to talk to the guy. He explained that they tried to contact me but I did not pick up the telephone call so they suspened the account. He said he will put back $5000 into my account. 1 week later money was still not in my account. Now this issue is going on for 2 weeks. I finally called and got my money put back immeidately. Long story short I closed the savings account, transfered money to Ally bank. 

Message 1 of 10
9 REPLIES 9
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Disappointed with Alliant


@Green456 wrote:

So few months back I was on my vaccation in Europe. I notified Alliant of my trip. While on the trip I set up a transfer to external account. They blocked the transfer, suspended my accout and deleted the external bank. A little bit excessive but one can still find this an acceptable action, especially that they tried to reach me via phone. Now my disappointment is that, they do have 24 hour service and when I called them first time, they claimed that I cannot log into my account because of system maintance and did not mention anything about my account being suspended. The 2nd phone call, 2 days later after they were done with their mainance, I was told that my account was suspended but they cannot help me because I have to wait until regular hours. What's the point of having 24 hours banking then??? I finally did wait until regular eastern time, I called again and was told that the person who handles fraud is at a meeting and unavialble. So 6th largest credit union in the country has only 1 person that can unlock my account? I finally managed to talk to the guy. He explained that they tried to contact me but I did not pick up the telephone call so they suspened the account. He said he will put back $5000 into my account. 1 week later money was still not in my account. Now this issue is going on for 2 weeks. I finally called and got my money put back immeidately. Long story short I closed the savings account, transfered money to Ally bank. 



Wow!  That does stink.  Sorry to hear that.

 

To me that would be quite excessive.  I travel a lot and have never had problems like that with USAA or Navy Federal.  It's also pretty amateur to have only one person in the whole organization who can solve that issue. I'd also jump ship just like you did.  

Message 2 of 10
DaveInAZ
Senior Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant


@Anonymous wrote:Wow!  That does stink.  Sorry to hear that.

 

To me that would be quite excessive.  I travel a lot and have never had problems like that with USAA or Navy Federal.  It's also pretty amateur to have only one person in the whole organization who can solve that issue. I'd also jump ship just like you did.  


Yes, that is really poor service from such a large CU, only 1 guy who can unsuspend accounts and no go if he's in a meeting??? But do you travel outside the US? Trying to access accounts from outside the US sets up serious security red flags, much more chance of fraud - they can tell from your IP address where you're accessing your account from. I once tried to access my PayPal account from Morocco and immediately got my account suspended. 

Message 3 of 10
VanderSnoot
Established Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant

Sorry you went through that, Green. Thanks for sharing your experience.

Message 4 of 10
Green456
Established Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant


@DaveInAZ wrote:

@Anonymous wrote:Wow!  That does stink.  Sorry to hear that.

 

To me that would be quite excessive.  I travel a lot and have never had problems like that with USAA or Navy Federal.  It's also pretty amateur to have only one person in the whole organization who can solve that issue. I'd also jump ship just like you did.  


Yes, that is really poor service from such a large CU, only 1 guy who can unsuspend accounts and no go if he's in a meeting??? But do you travel outside the US? Trying to access accounts from outside the US sets up serious security red flags, much more chance of fraud - they can tell from your IP address where you're accessing your account from. I once tried to access my PayPal account from Morocco and immediately got my account suspended. 


Yeah I don't have an issue with them locking my account, but I didn't like how despite their 24 hour service there was no one available to unlock my funds until next day and the next day that person was in a meeting. Them deleting my previously verified account and taking weeks to get back my $5,000 while I was out of country was not cool either. They simply lost my trust. 

Message 5 of 10
gen_zod
New Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant

Thanks for sharing your story. I was on the fence on closing my Alliant account. Your experience has convienced me to do so.

Message 6 of 10
Green456
Established Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant


@gen_zod wrote:

Thanks for sharing your story. I was on the fence on closing my Alliant account. Your experience has convienced me to do so.


Yeah we now use Ally Bank for our emergency fund and other large savings. My wife still use Alliant for small amounts of money for every day spending. But the above experience really turned me off from some of the credit unions who I feel are running skeleton crews and often their customer service is not much better than that of a national bank. 

Message 7 of 10
gen_zod
New Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant

My Alliant account is now officially closed. Thinking about closing my Ally account after a two week test run. External bank transfers are slow with Ally. I opens a Discover account and transfers with them are much fast and I like their GUI.
Message 8 of 10
Green456
Established Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant


@gen_zod wrote:
My Alliant account is now officially closed. Thinking about closing my Ally account after a two week test run. External bank transfers are slow with Ally. I opens a Discover account and transfers with them are much fast and I like their GUI.

I'm on the opposite boat. I like the granular display of accounts on Ally and dislike the way Discover and Chase make everything big. Plus Ally has better iOS mobile safari web app and this is what I mostly use for banking. So I recently closed Discover bank. Besides the UI difference both of them have IMO fantastic customer service. You can't go wrong with either one. 

 

Message 9 of 10
VanderSnoot
Established Contributor

Re: Disappointed with Alliant

I PC'ed my Signature Rewards to the Platinum (low APR) card before the 1st anniversary hit. It was a more of a hands on process than with a big bank like Chase, as I was bounced between a few departments before being connected with someone who could help, and I had to be very clear about not wanting a new application and credit pull. Disappointingly, because of the PC instead of new app, I wasn't offered the low end of the APR range, and had to settle for the high end, a meager 100 bp decrease from my previous card. It's SD'ed anyway, or will be, as soon as I change some default payment accounts.

Message 10 of 10
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