What is up with Chase Bank? Is it just me or is it spreading like a virus through the city?
Everywhere I turn in Sheepshead Bay and the surrounding area is another Chase Bank. Normally this might be considered a good thing, but I don’t think so. It was bad enough that Chase took over every Washington Mutual location when the FDIC handed the company to them. The logical assumption was that Chase would consolidate all their accounts, merge the staff together, and close locations that overlapped with another store. Boy was I wrong! Not only did they assimilate every location, they’re opening new ones!
It wouldn’t be so bad if their customer service didn’t go down the toilet at the same time. Not only are they keeping all the old branches open, and not only are they opening new locations, but each spot only has a skeleton staff and they closed nearly all the drive-through services.
Coney Island Avenue and Avenue V had a perfect drive-through teller. First they claimed it was closed for construction. Then they decided not to re-open it at all. In fact, if you look around the area Chase has a history of closing their drive throughs. The Chase on East 18th Street and Avenue U, and the Chase near Coney Island Avenue and Avenue Y both had windows for drive-through tellers, but those were phased out. The only nearby Chase with a drive-through is at West 3rd Street and Avenue X. Meanwhile other banks like Valley are opening branches with drive-throughs like the one on Nostrand Avenue and Avenue U.
If you’re wondering just how many Chase Banks we have, here’s a list. It includes all the Chase banks in Sheepshead Bay and those just at its border.
- 2623 East 17th Street and one block away…
- 1519 Sheepshead Bay Road .
- 2500 Coney Island Avenue (@ Avenue V) and…
- 2730 Coney Island Avenue (between Avenues X and Y) which line up with…
- 1002 Brighton Beach Avenue and…
- 722 Brighton Beach Avenue, both on the corner of Coney Island Avenue, which leads to another new Chase on…
- 105 Brighton Beach Avenue (Brighton 1st Street) seven short blocks away.
- 1100 Kings Highway, which is another new branch, also on Coney Island Avenue, and lines up with…
- 1521 Kings Highway (East 16th Street) and one block away…
- 1663 East 17th Street (between Kings Highway and Quentin Avenue).
- 1722 Avenue U (@ East 17th Street) and…
- 2560 Ocean Avenue (@ Avenue U) and…
- 2512 Avenue U (@ Bedford Avenue). There’s a Dr. Chase on Bedford Avenue but I don’t think he’s a bank so I’ll let him slide.
- Nostrand Avenue has a lone branch on it’s strip at 3804 Nostrand Avenue, but they have a Home Finance Office next door at 3820 Nostrand Avenue.
- For kicks and giggles, I’ll toss in West 3rd Street and Avenue X since it’s the only Chase left with a working drive-through teller.
Man, I don’t think any other bank comes even close to blanketing the area as much as Chase. TD Bank might come in at a very distant second.
What do you guys think? Are there too many Chase Banks in Sheepshead Bay and the surrounding area?
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There's no Chase branches on Neck Road yet. They need better distribution.
The branches on East 17th Street and U is larger than the old WaMu branch on Ocean. Same situation exist, to more of an extreme, in Sheepshead Bay. Thusly, and sadly, the former WaMu branches are often redundant. Unfortunately, closing them may cost some people their jobs.
Maybe they'll put a Chase Branch into Neck Road Station. Corporate sponsorship is on its way. The street will have to be renamed too. JP Morgan Chase Road? New Chase Avenue? Chase Place? Lots of money to be had here. Lord only knows the MTA needs it. Maybe they'll reconsider the decision to eliminate the B4.
Of course the bank will have to have exclusive advertising deals on the sides of those buses for at least 10 years. Hurray! A fee earning Chase ATM at the front of the bus!
With all the ATM machines and internet banking, you wouldn't think there was a need for so many bank offices. I haven't been to a teller window in years. Maybe the land is cheap, to them at least, and they are just sitting on it until the market for land turns and they can unload it at a profit.
It would cost MANAGEMENT their jobs. If they closed redundant locations they'd have to increase tellers and personal bankers to cover the increased traffic. These corporate shills are all the same. They'll cut their bottom line by cutting out the cheapest workers and fill the ranks with useless management.
Most of the WaMu locations out here are pretty low in terms of traffic. The increase in traffic at other branches wouldn't be that significant. Even the Chase branches don't have intolerably long lines. And the personal bankers are often not especially busy at both banks.
All the more reason why all these branches are just unnecessary. There isn't
nearly enough foot traffic to justify all these locations. Will some people
lose their jobs, yes of course but it's a waste of money what they are
doing.
Speaking of Chase….Chase just build brand NEW branch on Brighton Beach1st, then there are two existing ones on Coney island Ave and Brighton Beach right across each other. I had same thing in mind with a statement below when Chase took over Wu branches.
Arthur Borko
The logical assumption was that Chase would consolidate all their accounts, merge the staff together, and close locations that overlapped with another store. Boy was I wrong! Not only did they assimilate every location, they’re opening new ones!
Yes, I noted all 3 of those branches in my rant.
Damn i dislike your comment. I meant to click on the reply lol. Why people need to lose their jobs let Chase waste their money they have plenty of it. Its very hard nowadays without a job
@ Jim….bingo …you are right on the target
1) I believe eventually Chase will close some near promixty branches especially when property values increase.
2) Remember in early 2000's Chase nearly want to discontinue its Retail Bank business in favor of then more profitably Commercial/Investment Bank.
3) More branches does not equate to better services. Further, more retail branches means lower interest rates consumers receive in their CD, Savings, etc to cover the cost of retail branches operations and the unnecessary personal bankers.
This is happening all over the metro area. From Downtown Brooklyn to New Rochelle, every mom and pop pizza shop is closing up so Chase can put in 4 atm machines. Its insane.
I really can't complain about the large number of Chase Banks in the area since that's where my accounts are. It Kills me when I go to a non chase atm and find that I sometimes have to pay up to $3 to get some cash. They even have atms in Duane Reade stores. But, I have to agree with everyone that it just doesn't seem to make good business sense to have such a large concentration in one area.
In yet another “great minds think alike” coincidence, I was discussing this very same thing about the number of Chase banks with a friend of mine.
This is quite comprehensive, Arthur. I think Chase would do well in hiring you for their R&D department.
A few months ago it did occur to me that Chase was complicating my life with too many choices.
I believe there is a federal regulation that when a bank takes over another bank, they must keep all branches open for a period of 18 months. Chase is not crazy. I'm sure that they intend to close all locations that are within one block of another Chase branch as soon as they are legally permitted to.
Yeah I guess there are but obviously they are making money with them or else why would they keep all of those open. Personally I'm a Bank Of America customer and they have next to my house and in a couple more locations around Brooklyn. But when I got to Manhattan there is one on every block.
Well that makes sense.
[...] Here is a funny blog post where someone from Sheepshead Bay NY rants about Chase opening up more and more branches and staffing each one with less and less people as customer service goes down the drain. (blog) [...]
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