Schools Financial Credit Union

Why are others rating this place less than 5 stars? This place is awesome! I been a schools credit user since 08 i love it! I tend to only stick to the bank tellers that help me all the time i’ll wait in line and let people go a head of me just so i could go to «Cecilia» i believe thats her name and «Christy» i think thats her name but they have absolute great customer service.
Their pretty fast and efficient with their work they go over with u and show me where my money was deposited and my new balance is. I bought a brand new car a while bank i used schools they brought my interest to 2.0% better than the 6.5% that the dealer ship had gave me originally.
Hands down i think this place is great never had a problem with them, i come over other saturday morning to cash my check. Im not a fan of direct deposit, no sir re bob, i like my check in my hand and i like to manage it at the bank, i’ll do direct deposit the day im lazy enough to drive to the bank which it would probably be never :) check em out u might bump to me there some time.

What is there to say about Schools. It is a bank. Money is transacted here. My money is transacted here. I save it and I take it out and I put it back in. I’ve gone through quite a few cards in my time. Apparently now they have some sort of chip thing on them.
The tellers are all nice. There is usually a line. It is a moderate wait. I’ve never seen more than three tellers operating at once. I like checking myself out on the security cam while I wait. They do a good job of making sure my money doesn’t get randomly stolen I guess. Their credit card fees are not mind bogglingly insane like Wells Fargo located in the same large parking lot full of banks (Citibank is also here). Then again I don’t use a credit card so what do I know.
Schools is only located in California AFAIK so if you are trying to bank out of state you are s-​o-​l. I would like to switch banks but it’s a hassle and all my stuff’s here already so Schools it is.

Terrible phone wait no acknowledgement never got through and didn’t get a call back. That needs to be corrected

After over 20 years of banking at schools I have received nothing but the run-​around since they issued their new «chip» credit cards. What a mess. I activated the card and it was declined the first time I tried to use it — the bank said I put the expiration in wrong. The next day declined again– oops, they accidentally put a block on the card. My limit dropped, oops, someone accidentally manually lowered the limit. Ridiculous! The Visa department is staffed by baffoons. Looking for a new bank who knows the meaning of customer service.

Ive been with schools for quite some time and tiday i went to make a «large purchase «to which my card declined. Plenty of funds available, so i call the bank. They are experiencing a glitch and their system will not authorize large purchases for anyone and they have no eta for it being fixed. All the SUPERVISOR could say was «just keep trying till it goes through» is that what anyone should do who has an emergency situation until the issue is resolved? This is unacceptable. Ive also contacted local news. They can email people with random loan offers but they can’t notify us when our cards wint be working? I will be closing my account if this issue is not resolved in 24 hrs.

**Second update: I received a personal letter from Schools’ VP of Marketing this morning with a very sincere apology regarding our situation. While I was already made much happier after our situation was resolved a couple months ago (see previous update), this really showed that Schools’ is more dedicated to their customers than I assumed during our troubles. I have never had such a thoughtful response to an inconvenience by any company, and I am happy to start fresh and continue my business with them.
**Update to original review: After posting this review and leaving a very heated voicemail, I was contacted by Schools’ collections manager, Vicky. She was extremely apologetic, took a clearly significant amount of time to review my situation, and found out their third-​party partner was causing all of the problems with my insurance. She worked with my State Farm agent and the third-​party company, refunded my unnecessary payments, adjusted my interest back to where it was supposed to be, and corrected my credit report. I hate that I had to get angry before getting to speak with a manager, but I couldn’t ask for anything more in her response. I have adjusted my review accordingly, based on their response.
**ORIGINAL REVIEW**
I got an auto loan through SCU, and for the first several months all was perfectly fine. I set up automatic payments, never had any problems. Always paid my bill.
Then I got a call that I had a late payment for much more than my usual payment amount. I assumed it was a clerical error, since my automatic payment had already come out for the month. I called to clarify, and I was told that my payment (with no warning or documentation) had skyrocketed to well over twice its usual amount because I had let my car insurance lapse. I was shocked! My insurance had not changed in any way, and I told them I’d happily send my current card, but they demanded the actual policy from my agent be faxed to their office. This was handled right away, and I moved on without another thought. SCU told me I was all set and apologized for the misunderstanding.
Three months later — the same thing happened again. I called my insurance agent first this time, frustrated that he kept sending SCU a letter that I was canceling my policy. He said he had sent no such letter, and offered to once again fax my still-​current, never-​canceled policy.
This has happened now almost 10 times. I keep having to call my insurance agent to fax my policy in response to some mysterious letter from State Farm they say they keep getting that states that I’ve canceled my insurance. I get calls while I am at work and unable to handle the SCU representatives. I ask them to call my husband at home, and they refuse. My insurance agent offered to have them start making calls to him directly so he could fax my policy without me having to play middle man. They have also refused this. I asked for a copy of the letter they keep getting that claims I keep canceling my policy. While the reps have assured me that they have mailed these copies, I’ve never received them. Most recently, SCU dinged my credit report for a 30-​day late payment on one of these fabricated overcharges on my completely fictional insurance cancellations.

I have been a member since 1980! I am ending my relationship with this credit union. They don’t care about you and they don’t care about losing me as a customer! I have seen a major decline in Schools over the last decade. DO NOT BANK WITH SFCU The other negative reviewers here explain very well my reasons for discontinuing with them. (my credit score is 804 Proof of my one time accidental overdraw due to SFCU manipulation of the posting of the deposits, holds, LOC overdrafts, etc.) They need to get off their scripts/​rules!!! and treat us with respect.

Been with this bank for more then 20 years now. They are the easiest bank. Drive up ATM. Always get loans when I need them. The tellers are very professional. They always have the bills and change I need. No complaints! Schools credit union for life!

I been with Schools for over a year now. Every time I go in they are polite and very fast. I love this location. I would recommend this bank to anyone.

I used to like this bank. Everything seemed fair. The people seemed pretty nice. I have two other checking accounts with other banks, and things seem to go right with those accounts. I need those checking accounts for other purposes. Just recently, I started getting a lot of overdraft charges from ‘Schools’ that I didn’t think I should have gotten, so I looked into it further. To summarize quickly, I had a positive balance that still shows for a certain date, with 5 overdrafts while there was a positive balance, and what seems even worse about the bank, is that the representative told me that pending charges caused the bounces, and those charges were not even made until two days after the very fees were posted! I have recently made sure that I go on the internet to verify that there is a good solid available balance before I make any charges. Then, LAST WEEK HAPPENED. On the 28^th of January, I had 5 bounce fees that show up right now, and there is still a positive balance showing at the same time those charges were posted, way more than enough to pay for those transactions. A person would think that there would be no bounce fees in that situation. When I called in to ask why there would be a positive balance on a certain day, and it still shows that online, but with 5 overdrafts at the same time in the running total, the female representative told me that two charges that show up on the 30^th were pending on the 28^th. Then I looked to see which charges they were she was talking about, and to my surprise, they were both charges that I actually went online and paid on the 30^th, right after direct deposit day, two days after she said they were pending! I always wait until after I see that my direct deposit is counted as being posted before I pay my bills. One of the charges that the girl said was pending two days before direct deposit was for some tickets. I didn’t even look at the online ticket ordering until I knew that my direct deposit was showing up in my bank, and made the charges on the 30^th, and the representative told me that those charges were pending on the 28^th? THOSE CHARGES DIDN’T EVEN EXIST ON THE 28^th! Wow, but she is lying, and really, something should be done about this stealing. I printed out the order form online, and it does show that I did make that purchase on the 30^th. I have proof that I didn’t even buy those tickets till the 30^th and she is telling me that the charge was pending on the 28^th, and another bill I paid on the 30^th, with proof of that, and she said that’s why I had bounce fees??? Of course, it doesn’t show what was really pending on the 28^th, from what I could see on that date (and I always check that too, to see if there is something pending that will use up the money), there were no pending transactions. I know another lady/​friend of mine, that told me she closed her Schools account because of charges she shouldn’t have gotten. There should be some type of BANK POLICE out there. I am closing this account this afternoon, and have already printed out those pages that still show a positive balance with overdraft fees at the same time as a positive balance. If I can’t trust the bank when they say that I have an available balance, that the available balance is really available to me, but then it really isn’t, then I can’t use this bank anymore! I believe money is being siphoned into some other account and they always seem to come up with some excuse, but this last time, the girl was absolutely wrong in what she was telling me and I have proof of that. I will put the rest of my money into one of my other checking accounts, that I trust, AND THAT HAVE BEEN GOOD TO ME AND TREATED ME LIKE A VALUABLE CUSTOMER! If there happens to be something wrong with the bank computer system (which I have heard can happen), then they should be willing to cover the expenses, and make it right. I don’t expect that will ever happen with this Credit Union. I didn’t even ask for them to cover it, obviously, the girl tried to justify what happened in my account, and it just wasn’t right.

Well, I don’t think this is very fair. People are too quick to judge, but hard to give compliments.
I’ve been a member since ’09 and have been going to this particular location for about a year and a half now. I’ve had no problems. It’s always the same four tellers there whenever I happen to go and I have interacted with the four from different visits for different reasons. They always greet with a smile, courteous through the transaction and wishes me a good day when done. I haven’t gotten a rude or unprofessional one as almost everyone else here claims.
I did in fact call customer service before as well and it was quick and easy.
As it’s not possible to give half stars, two stars did get docked because I wasn’t eligible for a credit card here, but every where else? Uh, okay. Besides that non-​sense, I don’t have a problem.
And dealing with other small things like address and number changes, I log in to my account and make the changes myself, no hassle.

I am pretty pleased with this financial institution.
However, in the interest of personal financial privacy and brevity, a long-​winded I-​love-​my-​bank review will not do. But a long-​winded I hate Bank of America review will certainly suffice!
Of all my banks, past and present, this is the easiest and most pain-​free bank to deal with. No Bank-​of-​fucking-​America surprises of the NSF kind here, and they seem to actually care about your efforts to save and encourage/​remind you to do so when you make a deposit. I was even pressured to open an account for my daughter during one visit. I like when my bank tells me what to do with my money, because honestly, money makes me uncomfortable.
That is mostly the fault of Bank of America. I hate Bank of America. They are supreme AssHats. You ask them to fix the problems their weird «system» causes-​which takes hours, by the way-​and they want you to worship them for allowing you to spend your own money. Many times, they allowed transactions to «post» in such a way that they could charge ridiculous overdraft fees. And it would take days for deposits to post, despite the fact that I never have deposited a «bad» check. They royally eff up your finances and then expect you to appreciate their having the courtesy to reverse their own dizzy mistakes after hours of efforts to do so on awe-​inspiringly OLD dinosaur computers. These mistakes, of course, have a domino effect and then you’re playing the roulette of which Junior College dropout gets to analyze what has happened and whether they’re in the mood to fix this mess their built-​to-​screw-​you computers have made.
I honestly had some young pup with a tie on at B of A tell me how to spend differently so that their system wouldn’t make errors. How about I just spend my money the way I want, and you fix your system? This bank is straight up predatory.
Schools is like no other bank that I have banked at, and I never seem to have to deal with a lot of the just COMPLETE bullshit my better-​to-​do friends have to deal with at their respective big-​name banks. I don’t have time for a bunch of hairy bank problems and I LOATHE talking about money, unless we’re talking about how to make some money or how I can receive some money. Money problems give me out of control anxiety attacks and like I said, I’d rather my bank not make errors so I don’t have to talk about money.
I mean, I can deposit a check FROM MY PHONE! Is this not amazing? When I figured out how to do that recently, I told myself, «Self, you oughta write Schools a five-​star review cuz you have been smiling like a dizzy dope all day.» Ya! That was a really great day.
Since I joined Schools last year for checking, there have been no weird problems whatsoever. The customer service agents on the phone seem to hate their jobs, which is my only complaint. But hey, theirs is a dull ass job! Still, they do not make banking errors, so they can have as much assy attitude as they want. Honestly I probably call them too much as B of A has made me just absolutely paranoid about finances.
The staff at all of the branches are pretty considerate, and they always give Zoey like 10 dum dum lollipops so I can focus on whatever we have to discuss. It works!
Coming from B of A, It’s almost unfair to rate any bank as you know what rock-​bottom banking is like. This is probably review inflation resulting from years of Bank of America abuse and also Banc of America abuse. It’s like eating out of a dumpster your whole life and then reviewing Lyon’s and handing them 5 stars. Of course it’s great! You’ve been dumpster diving so long that you forgot what average is!
But damn I am thankful to have Bank of America out of my life. Thank you, God.

Worst cu ever! I got my car financed here from the dealer. They lost my first payment check, which when they found it 1 month later tried to deposit it and then charged me cause i out a stop pay on the lost check! Then when I was fed up and done they lost my first payoff check! They have the worst customer service and mailing system I have ever heard of. And I worked at a cu for 5 years!

Timmy, Andrea, and Mark L. are spot on.
I had to call customer service today for the simple task of changing my address.
Amazingly, the representative was able to pull of the task of being rude, condescending, arrogant, and as unhelpful as possible on such a simple request.
With so many people making the same complaint, is it management mistreating the employees and making them miserable?
Stay away from this credit union. I have moved to Golden1 and am very happy with everyone I have dealt with so far at Golden from the tellers all the way to the branch manager.

This has to be the worst bank in Sacramento. Extremely rude and miserable employees. From the management all the way to the tellers these people are awful. It seems their favorite word here is «NO» and this bank will find any way possible to rack up fees on your account. Want a paper statement, fee, want a cashiers check, fee, doesn’t seem to matter how much money you have in here, you will be treated like garbage. I thought credit unions were supposed to be different. More service, local business, nope. I get much better service at Wells Fargo of all places. I tried to use this bank to hold money for a down payment for a new home. Every time something came up no one had any interest in my needs, the answer was just always NO. I finally got fed up and took my $ 40k and put it in Wells Fargo next door. Surprisingly, Wells seems to want my business and my money. It’s a sad day when a local community bank is out done by a huge corporate bank, but it’s the case here. Just look at the other reviews, this place is a joke, avoid at all «costs»

Great location, service, and offers. Been a member since 1992 and no problems with SFCU — ever. I also visit their Natomas location same — no problems, great service and nice employee.

These people.. . I thought they were ok, until I got into an accident in July that totalled the car that they held the loan for. It has been a quagmire of red tape getting my insurance and gap coverage to pay off the loan with SCU, and during the time I was fighting THEM, SCU took it upon themselves to charge me all sorts of assorted fees though the car was gone and I was only waiting on my respective insurance policies to pay out.
When calling them to resolve the issue, I was met with so much patronization and rudeness from the representatives, though my gap coverage figures matched up perfectly and SCU’s didnt. They were defensive and full of denial. It wasnt until I got ahold of their supervisor that I was met with REAL professionalism and customer service. He seems to be actually doing something. Losing my car in that accident was upsetting enough without having to go through this.
Rude, unprofessional, beauracratic bullsh*t. Never again.

I agree. This place has some really RUDE peopple working for them, but they also have some really nice goodlooking ladys. anyway. I go pull money out with my ATM, the michine messes up and does not despense y money, after about 20 mins pleeding my case no money was retured or credited to my account. 3 days later i call and complain again nothing happens. a week later i get a VoiceMail from Loss Prevention say that this shouldve never happen and that the bank employees were simply doing there job. Kiss My ASS. believe a customer when they are telling the truth!

I would not recommend ever dealing with this credit union. I have only had rude service, and un reasonable people. I deal with other banks that are so helpful, and happy to have me as a customer. Schools is quite the opposite. My advice… keep shopping for someone else!