Review: Trailhead Credit Union - Old Town Branch

Customer Service ★☆☆☆☆

    I have only experienced worse customer service twice in my life, and both times were in Old Town. I'm telling you, do not shop or do business here. There are only three types of shopkeepers: ex-convicts who hate customers, animatronic housecats, and humans. See my other reviews for where to find the human shops; these people at Trailhead are housecats.

    As I was digging through the cards in my billfold to find the one for Trailhead, I said, "Oh, my name is...maybe you could look it up that way." He stared at me expressionless, unmoving, an animatronic that has gone into standby, as I struggled with my billfold (I also had a phone and keychain in my right hand). Once I had gotten the wallet out and a clerk was literally looking at it to type in my information, I asked, "How DO you look up the accounts? Is it by name?" Again, this guy does not respond in any fashion, as if squeezing his sphincter to pass a lie detector test.     At this point, I began berating him for his utter lack of competence in customer service and closed my account. At no point during this entire exchange does this housecat acknowledge his mistake or attempt to correct it via basic politeness. The other staff sat frozen like prey animals. At one point a customer walked in and we all pretended to act normal as if in a hostage situation.     Walking around the block and pondering this exchange, I decided to call Trailhead management and find out what's going on with their customer service? So I called the number for the Mississippi Avenue branch, informed the woman who picked up that I would like to speak to a manager, and then I told the whole story to a manager who pretended to listen until . . .     I am not kidding--he revealed to me that he is the manager at the branch I had just left. The comic timing was impeccable. He was nearly silent the whole time, and then--haha, surprise!     Apparently all of Trailhead's calls get routed to the Old Town branch, which, I gotta tell you, is a terrible mistake, because that branch specifically does not give one iota about customer service and they are undoubtedly costing every branch members because of their incompetence.     For the love of God, if your people do what you tell them, tell them to do better, because the script these animatronics have been given is inadequate. You need to splice in the ability to make eye contact and acknowledge their receival of information. You need to make them, not human, but human-like.     My friend who's lived in Portland for years tells me the decline of capitalism and Portland itself has people so cowed by their employers that many follow the letter of the rulebook while putting forth zero effort to listen and communicate with customers beyond the rote script, which is why they appear to behave like animatronics, and that I shouldn't blame them, because they're just struggling to pay rent in this American Hellscape, and they'd be human at work if they could. She says I should pity these people and pray for them.     But, you know what? I'm not going to. I'm just going to take my business to a credit union that gives a shit.