Banamex Meeting - June 2 at 10am

A friend gave me permission to pass this on:

"A meeting at Nueva Posada June 2 at 10am, has been set up with the regional
manager of Banamex to try to help all of us ex-pats get better service.
Rosemarie Trujillo was here late last year trying to jump start a new outreach
program for Banamex. Many of us attended a meeting with her. She got many of us
transferred to an interest bearing account but otherwise her visit didn't seem
to make any difference. Now, because of the ATM being down at Farmacia Guad for
several day and because of several other complaints sent to her, the "case is
being reopened" but under the supervision of this regional manager who is head
honcho of nine Mexican states. His coming here to meet with current customers
and future customers to hear what we need/want and do or don't have could be a
real signal that finally Banamex is waking up (this really is the 21st century
and yes, there are a ton of ex-pats here with money and a need to manage it
living in Mexico).

I have many subjects to bring up to him, including positives like having an
English speaker to help ex-pats in Chapala Banamex and having the special line
for preferred customers, and negatives like having so few ATMS working that
actually have money in them, not getting my promised low interest credit card,
parking in front of the Chapala Banamex and more. Some of you may want to talk
about other issues and I would encourage you to attend the meeting if you need
an easier way to get money down here or would like to check out what Banamex may
be able to offer us in life of their being a sister bank to BanamexUSA. This
enables those of us with accounts at both banks to transfer money at no charge
in a time period of 2 - 3 hours or less, to have an ATM card for both banks with
no fees and with the ability to get $1,000/day out when using both cards. Plus
one can go to Banamex and withdraw as much money as one needs as long as you
have it in the bank with just your Banamex card and passport.

I hope many of you will attend the meeting! This is our chance finally to have
the ear of somebody with authority from Banamex."

I wouldn´t hold my breath. Banamex is too corporate and would need to implement something on a nationwide basis as well as have people who can make the processes easier and cut the red tape. I closed my US Citi - Banamex account as it wasn´t worth it. B of A and Bancomer for here are the way to go.

My friend who has an account with Bamanex US doesn't have a US address - yes B of A would be the way to go, but he is really lame about taking care of his finances - he could find a relative to open a B of A account, but he can't deal with a computer. And he has had nothing but problems with Banamex US.

I don´t get mailed statements for my US B of A account so perhaps he could open it using a friend / family address and then have all statements online.

Intercasa wrote:I don´t get mailed statements for my US B of A account so perhaps he could open it using a friend / family address and then have all statements online.

Yes, I told him about that but he doesn't like to take care of finance or banking matters.

Hi Simpsca:

I took your advice and opened an ebank account yesterday with B of A while I still have a US address. So their affiliation is with Santender, correct?
Bancomer does not have any US ties do they? But I am hearing good things about their service with ed-pats.

Thanks for your advice.

Hi, Yes, I can use the Santander ATMs with no fee and so get a good exchange rate. However, if you have a problem using your ATM card you may have to call the bank. I was using mine then it wouldn't give me money. I got an email when I got home because "they suspected un-regular activity". I told them I am in Mexico and don't have plans to return so they made a note on my account and immediately I didn't have any more problems. You may want to call them and say you are traveling in Mexico just so they know. Don't use your B of A card for charges (which you can do). They charge you a 3 % foreign currency fee. I use my Merrill Lunch card for charges since the fee is much lower.

I don't know if Bancomer has any US affiliation. Maybe someone else on our board will answer.

Thanks again. The bank official did tell me to let them know if I will be traveling outside the country or state extensively, which is consistent with what you said.
I plan on using my Capitol One Venture credit card for charges since they have no foreign transaction fees.

Intercasa wrote:I wouldn´t hold my breath. Banamex is too corporate and would need to implement something on a nationwide basis as well as have people who can make the processes easier and cut the red tape. I closed my US Citi - Banamex account as it wasn´t worth it. B of A and Bancomer for here are the way to go.

That may be but we bank with both Bancomer and Banamex here in Ajijic and in San Cristóbal de Las Casas and have banked with Bancomer´s Ajijic branch since 2001 and Banamex´ San Cristóbal main branch since 2008. Bancomer is preferable as a bank in Ajijic because Banamex has no branch closer than Chapala. Banamax walks on Bancomer in service in San Cristóbal and is far the superior bank down there in which to do retail business. In fact, we opened the Banamex account, which is one block from the Bancomer branch down in San Cristóbal because Bancomer´s service was so bad. All that BS emanating from Bancomer about "Preferred Customers" because you are an English speaking foreigner in Chiapas is laughable as very few such creatures exist in that community. When we first moved to San Cristóbal in 2006, we took our "Preferred Customer" card to the preferred customer line and branch management interceded to ask what we were doing there. We showed them that phony card issued in Ajijic and they invited us to rejoin our more common brethren in the line designated for clients without presumed stars up their butts because they were foreign residents. Now, Banamex has a preferred customer program that allows you these privileges even if you only speak Lithuanian. That program is more rationally based on your real value to the bank, not your exotic language.

Any experienced branch banker such as Dawg knows that important customers are not defined by the language they speak or the personal characteristics they exhibit or cars they drive or neighborhoods in which they live or the way thy dress but their contribution to the bank´s bottom line profits which can often be directy correlated inversely with their money mangement skills. One of my most important customers when I managed Barclays Bank´s flagship branch in Downtown Oakland in the 1980s was Huey Newton of Black Panther fame before he was gunned down in West Oakland at 2:00AM in a drug deal gone bad. He was actually a neat guy vis-a-vis his banker although he may have associated with some reprobates. Bankers don´t love you; they love your money and treasure the fact that they, and perhaps not you, know how to make money work for them and not you.

Fee waivers are a primary tool of banker´s deception.

simpsca wrote:A friend gave me permission to pass this on:

"A meeting at Nueva Posada June 2 at 10am, has been set up with the regional
manager of Banamex to try to help all of us ex-pats get better service....I hope many of you will attend the meeting! This is our chance finally to have
the ear of somebody with authority from Banamex."

Regional managers in Mexican foreign bank subsidiaries such as Banamex and Bancomer and Santander and HSBC and you name it that are headquartered in Mexico City where corporate hierarchies enconsed in their fancy urban highrises are convinced their unsophisticated rustic cousins managing accounts of foreign retiree bumpkins who couldn´t make it in their home countries and Mexican peasants who couldn´t make it in Mexico City and none of whom, in their minds could muster the intellect to change a peso, would simply have nothing to say of value to the discerning corporate climbers there overlooking Chepultepec so the notion that a group of foreigners admonishing some regional flack in the environs of El Rancho Grande at a garden party at some woebegone hotel of little in any nationwide stature would actually affect corporate policy is laughable to them in ther sad little cubicles so we won´t attend but our reasons are more thoughtful than they appear to be on the surface. Our account is domiciled in San Cristóbal de Las Casas which is way outside of the reach of this visiting regional manager and, anyway, customer service in Chiapas is nonpareil. We love the San Cristóbal main branch, at least as any same person can atually love a bank. We do wish you luck here in the Chapala area but our own corporate lives over many years tells us it´s a charade. The same charade played out endessly from every corner of the globe including the functionaries ruling Burkino Faso from Oaugadougou. Human nature seems immutable in this regard.

Meeting has been postponed.