When you receive unemployment benefits in Alaska, there are three choices for how you want to receive the payments: electronically to a Chase debit card account; to your own account, or a check by mail.
In case you miss that page in the detailed Web application, the default is the Chase account. Chase sets up an account once you qualify for benefits and your payment is deposited into that account. You can use your debit card the regular way and you can also use their bill-pay function by setting up the accounts for each entity you pay for regular billings.
Somewhere in the fine print they sent it said some bill payments may be charged a fee. Some. On checking my first round of payments I discovered Chase had charged 75 cents for each transaction. Later the bank charged me 95 cents for a paper statement. This bank just a couple of years ago received a bailout from the federal government to the tune of $25 billion (with a B) and then turned around and used it for acquisitions of companies that were expected to prosper during a recession and even a depression, rather than try to ease the mortgage situation that started the process that ended up with banks needing bailouts.
That very same bank is charging Alaska's most unfortunate people, the unemployed, a fee, outrageous at any price, to use their unemployment benefits. I have been using bill-pay with two other banks for years and have never been charged a fee. Now, the state of Alaska, by using Chase, is enabling that theft. I suspect the state also pays Chase for the privilege of letting them manage the account, so the bank double dips to steal from Alaskans on unemployment. I intend to research that and find out what management of that account is costing the state. And what does Chase gain from charging Alaskans for bill-pay transactions? In January, 29,233 Alaskans were on unemployment. If two thirds of those used the Chase account and paid four bills a month, Chase would receive $54,446. Not much by megabanking standards but over a year it comes to $701,592, taken off the backs of Alaskans struggling to make ends meet.
This sort of thing goes a long way toward explaining what the Occupy Wall Street movement is all about and why it is important. In support of that movement I have already moved all my accounts out of the megabank I was using, one that took a bailout and then held a retreat for its top executives that was scheduled in Palm Springs, Calif., at a cost of more than $1 million. What little I have is now in two local credit unions and in recent statistics I learned there has been about an 11 percent turnover in depositors following this route. That's a number that pretty soon should start getting some attention from someone.
Meanwhile the Chase connection with the state of Alaska is going to be examined.
I am not alone: Make this Google search: Chase Bank rips off Alaska unemployment. Seems people in other states are experiencing the same thing at the hands of JPMorgan Chase.
NOTE: I see a lot of people reach this page with a search asking if there is a Chase Bank in Alaska. NO there isn't, however the state has made a connection with an independent ATM provider to handle Chase credit and debit cards, probably another handout to take a cut from our unemployment checks.
Update 1/31/13 Banks, states force jobless to pay needless fees
Follow-up with links to other posts and stories
Move your money
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Memorable quotations
The best way to know you are having an adventure is when you wish you were home talking about it." — a mechanic on the Alaska State Ferry System. Or as in my own case planning how I will be writing it on this blog.
"You can't promote principled anti-corruption without pissing off corrupt people." — George Kent
"If only the British had held on to the airports, the whole thing might have gone differently for us." — Mick Jagger
"You can do anything as long as you don't scare the horses." — a mother's favorite saying recalled by a friend
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“Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut.” — Ernest Hemingway
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The thing about ignorance is, you don't have to remain ignorant. — me again"
"It was like the aftermath of an orgasm with the wrong partner." – David Lagercrants “The Girl in the Spider’s Web.”
Why worry about dying, you aren't going to live to regret it.
Never debate with someone who gets ink by the barrel" — George Hayes, former Alaska Attorney General who died recently
My dear Mr. Frost: two roads never diverge in a yellow wood. Three roads meet there. — @Shakespeare on Twitter
Normal is how somebody else thinks you should act.
"The mark of a great shiphandler is never getting into situations that require great shiphandling," Adm. Ernest King, USN
Me: Does the restaurant have cute waitresses?
My friend Gail: All waitresses are cute when you're hungry.
I'm not a writer, but sometimes I push around words to see what happens. – Scott Berry
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A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity. – Franz Kafka
We are all immortal until the one day we are not. – me again
If the muse is late, start without her – Peter S. Beagle
Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. ~Mark Twain Actually you could do the same thing with the word "really" as in "really cold."
If you are looking for an experience that will temper your vanity, this is it. There's no one to impress when you're alone on the trap line. – Michael Carey quoting his father's journal
Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. – Benjamin Franklin
It’s nervous work. The state you need to write in is the state that others are paying large sums of money to get rid of. – Shirley Hazzard
So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence -- Bertrand Russell
You know that I always just wanted to have a small ship to take stuff from a place that had a lot of that stuff to a place that did not have a lot of that stuff and so prosper.—Jackie Faber, “The Wake of the Lorelei Lee”
If you attack the arguer instead of the argument, you lose both
If an insurance company won’t pay for damages caused by an “act of God,” shouldn’t it then have to prove the existence of God? – I said that
I used to think getting old was about vanity—but actually it’s about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial. – Eugene O’Neill
German General to Swiss General: “You have only 500,000 men in your army; what would you do if I invaded with 1 million men?”
Swiss General: “Well, I suppose every one of my soldiers would need to fire twice.”
Writing is the only thing that when I do it, I don’t feel I should be doing something else.—Gloria Steinem
Exceed your bandwidth—sign on the wall of the maintenance shop at the West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Center
One thing I do know, if you keep at it, you usually wind up getting something done.—Patricia Monaghan
Do you want to know what kind of person makes the best reporter? I’ll tell you. A borderline sociopath. Someone smart, inquisitive, stubborn, disorganized, chaotic, and in a perpetual state of simmering rage at the failings of the world.—Brett Arends
It is a very simple mind that only knows how to spell a word one way.—Andrew Jackson
3:30 is too late or too early to do anything—Rene Descartes
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Talkeetna: A friendly little drinking town with a climbing problem.—a handmade bumper sticker
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Woman stabs husband with squirrel for not buying beer Christmas Eve
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I wonder how many other states have a similar arrangement with Chase or another big bank?
ReplyDeleteI wonder what other states have a similar arrangement with Chase.
ReplyDeleteI just started receiving my unemployment in Anchorage. I'm definitely direct depositing to my primary bank. Chase can shove it!
ReplyDeleteHi Tim,
ReplyDeleteThanks for this. I'm actually about to bring a small claims suit against Chase. This establishes clearly that Chase does business in Alaska.
Thank You!