Why I have no love for Citizens Bank

If there is anything that can really sour my day it's not being able to access money when I need it. Citizens Bank has done just that and gotten on my last nerve. While I can understand the idea of protecting the bank against false charges, the bank owes its customers the right to be informed that their charges have been flagged and that future activity on the account may be stopped.

Chase called me not one, not two but, THREE times to verify some charges I made. Citizens Bank did not even attempt to call me once. They didn't even send me an email or one of those "secured messages" through their website. Just all of a sudden, they started declining charges. Of course, I immediately checked my account balance as soon as I returned to my computer and everything looked fine... still no notice of suspicion. Given the crazy time difference, I sent Customer Service a "secured message" explaining the situation and asking them to remove the flag. Still, no response. Anyway, earlier today, I went to withdraw some money from my account and guess what happened? The ATM retained my card (needless to say, it also did not give me any money). So, now what??

I call that bank responsible for the ATM and they tell me that because of the various processes required, I should get my card in about two weeks. TWO WEEKS?!?!?! Two weeks and no access to my money?!?! Sadly, I realized that they weren't kidding... not even a little bit. They said they'd try to expedite it but couldn't promise anything. You can only imagine how bullsh*t I was at this point.

So then, I call Citizens' remarkably unhelpful 24/7 "help" line. All the call center rep could do was confirm what I already knew... yes, my account had been flagged. I think our conversation went something like this...
Me: Can you remove the flag?
Her: No. Only the consumer fraud department can do that but, (optimistically) they're open between 9am & 9pm EST.
Me: Well, seeing that I'm 13 hours ahead that means 10pm to 10am.
Her: Oh, I'm sorry. Well, that's really your only option.

At this point I wanted to reach the phone and shake her, really really hard. Then I explained my whole card problem and she said well we can send you an emergency card via FedEx and you have to sign for it. She almost made up for her prior uselessness in that statement alone. But then just when there was a glimmer of hope she says, however, we can't do that until the fraud department has removed the flag so you have to call back tonight. And all of a sudden, she was useless again.

While this may be the biggest incident where Citizens has managed to completely frustrate me, it is, sadly, not their first. Therefore, one of the first things I will do as soon as I return to Boston is change banks because quite frankly Citizens is doing NOTHING for me.