SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — Business customers of the former First Republic Bank are struggling to withdraw their funds in a timely manner after JPMorgan Chase took over management of the failed bank. One customer contacted 7 On Your Side after being unable to access their funds.
JPMorgan Chase said customers with business lines of credit will need to call its support line at 888-408-0288 to withdraw funds until the transition is complete later this year.
Russell Linegrover is a music lover who has turned his passion into a career running Jiffy Tickets, a business that resells concert, theater, and sports tickets.
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“I love music and have been to over 1,000 events, concerts, plays and sporting events,” Linegrover said.
But Linegrover feels like he’s on the losing end of First Republic Bank’s acquisition by JPMorgan Chase.
“I’ve been a First Republic Bank customer for a long time and it’s my favorite bank I’ve ever used,” he said.
JPMorgan Chase told 7 On Your Side last week that it had migrated 800,000 personal and business deposit accounts onto JPMorgan Chase’s system.
Some products, such as business lines of credit, won’t be transferred to JPMorgan Chase’s system until later this year.
And therein lies the problem.
“Unfortunately, my business line of credit is in limbo right now. It’s trapped inside First Republic online and I can’t do anything online with First Republic. It hasn’t been migrated over to Chase yet so I can’t access it to withdraw money or make payments,” Linegrover said.
The same thing happened to several Chase customers in San Francisco, but the bank denied their claims. So what rights do you have if your money is stolen?
Linegrover can’t even go into a Chase branch, and he doesn’t yet have a Chase account number until the transition is complete.
“I was at the bank last week and I met two small business owners who were having the exact same problem as me,” he said.
At the moment, the only option for customers like him is to call the support line and speak to a representative to make a withdrawal request.
“Right now I have to wait an hour and a half to get through to someone in Chase’s business department,” Linegrover said.
The bank told ABC7 News that call volumes are higher than normal and they expect call wait times to continue to decrease each day.
“In this case, we had a number of invoices that were due last week that we couldn’t pay because we didn’t have access to our credit line,” Linegrover said.
A victim who was tricked by a thief using glue and the “tap” feature secretly recorded surveillance video of himself in an attempt to get back the stolen $1,640.
Linegrover says he had to transfer thousands of dollars from his personal line of credit to pay his Jiffy bill.
“Terrible, terrible customer service,” he said.
He contacted 7 On Your Side and after we contacted the bank, he says a team leader called him and told him the account would be transferred in October, four months from now.
“This is a David vs. Goliath battle. I don’t have any answers, but I was hoping you guys would,” Linegrover said.
Even with the additional information, Linegrover said he plans to open an account with another bank, apply for a line of credit there and close his Chase account. JPMorgan Chase said it could not disclose the exact number of customers with business lines of credit that would be affected.
Check out more stories and videos from Michael Finney and 7 On Your Side.
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