Hi all, I’m being promoted to a banker in a very wealthy area. My focus would be investment sales and mortgages. I’ve been in the industry about a year and very successful so far. No issues with my colleagues and management has been quite happy. I bring in a lot of sales for my branch. I’m also very happy to be at work and in this industry, so it tends to show in my performance.

My concern is that I look very young. The last question of my first interview with the bank was if I was old enough to work there. I have tattoos and I dress professionally but I still get questions (rightfully so) about my age. I take it well and very personable and friendly. I just don’t want to be considered less-than because of my looks. I’m 21 and due to medical reasons, I look closer to 15 despite the tattoos and mature demeanor. I’m also getting braces soon and I know it won’t help.

Everyday I’m going to show up with the right attitude and dressed in a suit. I want to perform my best. The other banker is only 23 so at least I’m not alone here. Any tips for this?

Bit of a rant incoming… Had a customer call in today, immediately pissed, about an ATM fee on his account. For context, this particular FI charges $3.50 to use an out-of-network ATM. He “had to” use a out-of-network ATM because he “needed” cash “right then” and the particular one he tried using was down (there’s another one less than a mile away but I digress). He’s bitchin’ up a storm saying we “stole” his money. I tell him the manager at the branch that manages his account is out of office today and she is the ONLY one with authority to refund the fee and it’s up to her discretion. He snaps stating that this is getting rectified today or he’s going elsewhere. This guy is a known POS and has like $300. Sir… is that a promise? Anyways, what the hell does this guy want me to do? Almost 20 minutes on the phone for $3.50!

This lady just came in about an hour ago and was greeted by my coworker with a “good afternoon, I’ll be with you in just a moment” and she waltzed her way up. Coworker said “hi there, I’ll be just a moment, not sure if you heard me” in a kind tone and the lady replies with “yeah. I heard you” and starts putting her card and ID on the station. I run over and grab her to my station and ask her what we’re doing today.

She lets me know how pissed she is because her other bank is currently overdrawn and she can’t believe the democrats would cause something like this. That she voted for the right man and he’s going to make everything right (lol). She then proceeds to withdrawal a couple bucks out of her account and is rambling on about how the dems caused her to be poor and how she can’t wait for The Man to set things straight.

I did not speak other than clarifying denomination and if she wanted a receipt, it’s Friday and sunny where I am and I wasn’t going to risk her flying off on me. She takes her cash and goes “I can’t believe it. I forgot this bill was going to be pulled from my account. I can’t believe the dems did this”.

TIL: the democrats control the scheduled and automated bills in your name apparently. Just had to laugh and share

To this day I still remember, back when I first got into banking (2015) was just a teller lol here goes

Was about mid June (90 degrees out) man comes in asking to go into his box. I have I’m sign the flip and bring him into the vault have him grasp the box. (I remembered in teller training that banks very much frown on cash being placed into boxes. (This man came in wearing shorts and a white t shirt. Man proceeded to walk from the safety deposit box room holding mounds of cash 🤣🤣💀 comes to the counter and drops it all on the counter. Still remember it was $400,000.00 and looked at me with a straight face and requested to deposit. I asked how he came into so much cash and he proceeded to state he was hiding it from the government 💀💀 I did his deposit and filled out a SAR and very quickly I got questioned by risk and all the newly deposited cash plus funds already in the account had been frozen. Found out months later the customer was put in jail for laundering money for some very bad things. Government swooped that money up very quickly.

Ah yes, another customer demanding I drop everything to cash a check worth less than a gumball. “I don’t care if it’s two cents, it’s MY money!” Sir, the cost of paper, ink, and your gas getting here is already 100x the check’s value. But sure, let me just alert the vault manager for this HIGH-PRIORITY transaction. 🫡

Hi ! Is anyone here currently working as a Teller in the U.S.?

I’m originally from Asia, and during my training back home, we were taught to address customers and clients as “Ma’am” or “Sir.” If we knew their names, we would automatically refer to them as “Ms. [Name]” or “Sir [Name].”

I'll soon be starting as a part-time Teller in the U.S., and I understand that people here can be more sensitive when it comes to pronouns and how they’re addressed. I’d really appreciate any advice—how can I avoid making mistakes in addressing customers? Should I completely avoid using gendered titles if I’m unsure, or is there a polite, inclusive way to go about it?

Thanks in advance!

Title, on 4/1 my boss called me and another newer teller into her office to tell us we were being let go due to changes in staffing structure. She was in tears while telling us this and everything seemed legit, she had our market manager there to help break the news. After left her office I immediately went to start packing my things up just for her to tell me it was a joke.

Now I’m all for fun in the workplace, but does that seem crazy to anyone else? What are my options here and should I even go to a higher up about it?

Not sure if this is the right place to ask, but I applied for a personal banker position and was hired pending background check and credit check. Background check is completely clean, but my credit isn’t great(around 600)s. Have a couple charged off credit cards and a repo a few years ago. Over the past couple years I have all my credit cards paid off that I currently use and just paid off one vehicle(never late), and currently paying on another one(never late). Am I likely to be hired?

I thought I heard it all in my career at my bank's call center, and someone really said this. I guess we should just let any and all transactions go through without question 🙄 These are the same people that give out their social security number and account number like candy too. -end rant-

I’m far from my own location already and they want me to cover banks that are 1 1/2 hours away. How do I say no? Money and savings is great ofc but this is not a job i desperately need as im going to school and parents support me.

I feel cold calling is like harassment almost. If a banker gets assigned a call and the customer doesn’t pick up, we’ll have to leave a voicemail. At first I thought it’s a one time thing, if they don’t call back then we won’t see them again. But I was wrong. Within 30 days another banker or same banker will get the same customer assigned, and we’ll have to call them again. The manager also has the ability to reassign it to someone else, so even if last week there was a call that was not successful, the manager can reopen it and assign it to another banker the very next week. If I was a customer getting calls repeatedly every week/month I would be very upset. Obviously there’s a reason customers don’t call back. But these customers don’t complain to be put on the do not call list, so we keep calling…

Hi! I started as a part time teller at a credit union this past February, so I’ve been working a little under 2 months.

I actually really like it and enjoy working. This Saturday they have me working the whole day as the only teller in the branch. I have a limit of 1k so I just know all day I’ll be calling for override all damn day from my manager.

I’m just a little intimidated. I know I CAN do it but is it normal for them to have someone be the only teller for an entire day after barely two months of working??

I’ve seen a lot of banks give titles to their employees like Banking Officer, AVP, VP, SVP and such.

How did you get your title? And how do you go about asking for a title at a new FI?

Hello all, so I had a interview today for a well known credit union for member service representative. I was very excited since it’s only like 10 minutes from my house lol.

I went in, practiced the night before. The interview was ehhh.. the manager wasn’t even paying attention but rather typing on her keyboard and ignoring eye contact, showed no attention to even be bothered for an interview.. I was speaking more with the assistant manager than the actual manager.

I am little defeated and disappointed at myself for probably not doing better.. (I currently have a job) but I guess any tips on what I can do after the interview besides send an email?

So this lady walks up to my counter and goes, "I need to speak to the manager." I point to my name tag and say, "That's me!" She stares blankly for a second and then asks, "No, the real manager." 😅 I swear, at this point, I’m considering getting a "Manager" sticker just to help out with the confusion.

I’m sure this has been answered but just reaching out for advice. 7 years as a detective straight out of college and currently a year of life insurance and annuity sales. Really interested into getting back into the investigatory world of things. What can I do to stand out to companies? I know the CFE is the golden standard and will help but the certification is so expensive lol. Any advice would be appreciated!

Three people in a one hour span screamed at me today.

First lady, nice enough during the transaction. Wanted to get cashier checks on behalf of someone else. I told her she can, but she still has to have her name in the remitter and can put the other persons name in the memo. She agreed. After printing them off, she realized she misunderstood me and was screaming saying her name can’t be on the checks. I told her we legally can’t change the remitter. On to the manager and a swift exit afterwards.

Second lady, ATM deposited a post dated check on Friday. Had to reverse the deposit and tell her we’d get a legal copy of it in 2 business days (today). She agreed. She calls today around noon repeating the same thing to me for 10 minutes. “I was told it’d be today I don’t see the deposit”, “Why couldn’t you have deposited it this morning”, “You don’t know what you’re doing”. Blah blah blah. You know. Of course 30 minutes after the call the courier brings the legal copy and I deposit it into her account.

Last dude, not a member here, but wanted to use our coin machine. Only association is he was his late grandmother’s (dead for 2 years atp) POA. Means nothing after death. He never bothered to open an account here through family while she was alive. I explained to him we can’t do it for non members. And he suddenly got very irate, saying he’s done it before and I don’t know what I’m talking about. Literally screaming at me. He demanded a manager and then went and spoke to just a regular loan officer. Got the same answer from him. Came BACK to me at the teller line and screamed he will be back to get all of his grandmothers money out of this institution (~$2,000). Anyways.

Fun day

Last week a customer called to ask if her Social Security deposit would go in on Monday since it usually goes in on the first. I said it only goes in early if the first is a weekend or holiday. She say yeah April fools is a National holiday, right? I couldn’t answer for a moment because this has to be a joke, right? I then explained that it is not a federal holiday and her deposit will be there on the first. Was she joking or really thought that?

Okay, not really, we were never friends.

Now that song is stuck in my head for the next two hours. I would like Country Roads and the narwhal song back please.

Doesn't help that my manager keeps humming it now too. Only time I hate that we don't have any music playing in branch.

Hey everyone, so I used to work as a teller back in college. And now my college cousin approached me for advice about working as a teller. Curiois to know - is it still worth pursuing as a college job?

Back in the day (like 2017) it helped a lot with paying bill and getting banking experience so it was a no brainer. But I'm not sure if that's still the case now with AI & Crypto being more mainstream.

Would appreciate any outside opinions here

Anyone have their experience moving from relationship banker to wealth management client associate in Merrill lynch ? I would really appreciate if you share your journey. I need suggestions too, little context about me. I am currently working as relationship banker for 1 year 5 months, I have good score cards, I meet all the metrics, never made mistakes while in teller too. I do my work with due diligence and integrity that’s why I mistakenly became so important in my branch that all the works are given to me which I didn’t mind. But now here’s the big thing, after doing everything seemingly perfect, my boss and my bosses boss don’t want me to move to wealth management division. They are creating so much block for me. There is also ongoing staffing issues in my center and they keep saying “you are a backbone for us and you are not going anywhere. Even if you get hired to the new role, you’d have to wait for 60 days” which means it’s a NO from the WM team because no employer would like to wait for 60 days and make me go under trainings again. Before this I applied for senior banker to different location, and my bosses’ boss said I had everything that’s needed and met all metrics but they are hiring external and they have good position coming up for me in my own branch ( as she discussed with my manager) which turns out position is not open yet. Because they currently froze hiring. I feel like I am stuck and the management is just looking for their benefit but I don’t know what to do next.

Idon’t have liscences yet but I had my undergrad degree and 4 years of digital marketing experience from my home country.

Banking is not for me. I really wish it was, I had high hopes. It’s been a year now and I am just so unhappy. Unhappy with pushing loans and credit cards on people who do not need them, unhappy with being yelled at trying to protect customer from fraud, and unhappy being constantly stressed that I make a mistake (wrong name on check, misdated, legal line wrong ect.)

I don’t like the “they have a lot of money with us, let it slide” mentality. I don’t like treating people differently because of how much they have in their accounts or the “do you know who I am?” or “they do it at the other branch” clients.

I’ve always done retail, obviously want out but do not want to be a banker. I don’t want to sit at a desk all day while my brain melts from my eats because there is nothing to do.

Where can I go from here? I want a career. I can’t afford school. I just feel so stuck.

Thanks for listening to my rant. Appreciate any advice or words of encouragement.

I’ve been in banking for over ten years at this bank. Over the last year or so it has turned into a COMPLETELY different environment. The sales pressure has TRIPLED and it’s just not okay. I’m in school for accounting and been applying like crazy to try to get out. I just hate the sales pressure. The culture has always been to “offer advice” which it still is but they just have gotten so completely out of control. People are losing their jobs for integrity issues, my manager has been trying to force things on me and it’s making me so crazy and I don’t know whether to go to him with my concern (again) or just report him to the ethics hotline/someone above him. I don’t want to see him get fired or any of my co workers because they’re great people and I know it’s not their fault but I’m just so done. Soooo so done. Idk what to do, it is just time to get out and I’m praying I find something :(

Just had to vent

I’ve been a teller at this branch for about six months now and there are ups and downs. I have a great team and managers which is such a blessing and a rarity in retail settings i feel like. I was a teller at another branch for a year before so I had some experience and fell into the swing of things quite quickly. I have a great schedule and get paid pretty well. But I’m in college and this fall i don’t think my school schedule will allow me to continue working with the banks hours. my manager and I have talked about it and we’ll see when we get there who knows. But mostly I’m just working as much as I can and saving as much as I can

How do I not lose my mind? Even at my old branch stuff was NOT this crazy. It was a busier branch but this one is so much more. We’re almost always understaffed and customers are so awful! I know banking people get really crazy in general but this is just making me so stressed! Sometimes I find myself snapping at someone yelling at me just to get them to stop and I know it’s so unprofessional I just can’t get a word in and make them calm down otherwise. It makes me constantly afraid i’ll mess up something and I’m just always stressed someone will lose it on me. My managers are luckily very good with handling it but if they’re not next to me or busy I get really scared. I don’t mean to be dramatic but a lot of people are just not well and we’ve had instances in the past where it’s been scary. I’m trying my best but it feels up to my neck sometimes

I’m grateful for my job and my team and i know any customer service position is gonna be really hard with that kind of stuff but how do I not lose my mind and stay calm in the meantime? I’m just a shy anxious person in general and it’s a lot. I have a lot of customer service experience but only a year and some change of teller experience. my coworkers always seem to know what to do and it’s just another day for them. How do you seasoned retail banking peeps do it?

Happened roughly 2 decades ago but still a funny story. I was working at a branch and as the title said this lady walked in with at least 5 blue recycling boxes full of loose coins. She had them stacked on a dolly and wheeled them in the front door. She got into the line and was giggling, she kept saying to other people in line "oh they are going to hate me!" referring to the tellers who she thought was going to count thousands of coins. She kept commenting how this was decades of loose change and how it was going to "pay for her next vacation". The other customers were smiling and giggling as well. It was just random coins of every denomination thrown into these massive boxes. This was in the mid 00s, well before coin counting machines were common in branches.

After waiting in line she finally got up to the teller and the single greatest moment in the history of banking occurred. The teller informed her that we do not take unrolled coins. She of course freaked out and demanded that we take them and we continually refused. Eventually the branch manager came out and also told her we are not accepting these for deposit. She made a scene and threatened to call head office but the manager still refused. Hilariously he actually said something along the lines of "Do you think we are going to sit here for hours rolling these for you for free? Do you know how absurd that is?"

Anyways she eventually got angry and left. It ended up being all of the tellers that were the ones giggling at this idiotic lady who we never saw or heard from again.