Bank of America payment charges irk Illinois homeowner

By Bob Bong
Southland Savvy

I bought my home 23 years ago with help from the Illinois Housing Development Authority, which financed my mortgage through a first-time home owners program.

The mortgage was issued through a bank in Bolingbrook that no longer exists. No surprise there, given the way big banks have gobbled up little banks in recent years.

The mortgage was first taken over by Hemlock Bank, another institution that no longer exists.

Then the mortgage passed on to Marquette Bank, which was the gobbler of Hemlock Bank.

Paying the mortgage was nice and easy. If you didn’t want to drop it in the mail, you could drop the payment off at the bank. Hemlock was in Oak Forest and Marquette was in Orland Park.

In all of those years, the mortgage was serviced by a locally-owned bank.

All of that changed last month when Bank of America took over as servicer of the mortgage. The same Bank of America that needed a government bailout of $45 billion in cash and $100 billion in bad-asset guarantees to stay afloat.

After one month as an unwilling customer, I can understand how Bank of America was able to repay the bailout in September.

Bank of America is based in California. The coupons I received to pay the mortgage are to be mailed to California. Questions about why I should be paying an Illinois-backed mortgage to a bank in California aside, I wanted to know my payment options. I used to be able to drop my Marquette payment in the mail on Monday and have it accredited to my account by Wednesday. Knowing the mail from here to California is not so timely, I called the 800 number listed.

I won’t even guess where the call was routed to, but I’m guessing it wasn’t Simi Valley, Ca., Bank of America’s home loans headquarters.

Here’s what I found out. Payments should be mailed a week before the due date. That should get the payment there in time. But there is no guarantee it will arrive and be posted in time.

Failing that, I could drop off the payment at a Bank of America location near here. But it won’t post to my account for two to three business days.

In the words of my 800 number operator Zulfi, “Banks are not payment centers.” My argument that my check in their hands in one of their banks should mean something didn’t seem to win her over.

I also could pay by phone, the payment posts the same day as long as received before 3 p.m. Chicago time. The catch is that there is a $15 charge for using the automated system and $20 charge for having someone such as Zulfi handle the transaction.

What about the Internet? “Sure, you can pay at our website,” Zulfi said. I signed up. I’ll get my temporary password to establish my online account in seven to 10 working days. Oh, yes, there’s a $6 charge for paying online. I didn’t have the strength left to ask how long it would take for a payment to be posted to my account.

My daughter, wise one that she has become, said I should open a Bank of America account and put enough money in every month to cover the mortgage and set up an automatic payment. I just wonder how much that costs?