In My Own Words

Y’all know me – among other things, I’m a Patriotic American citizen, with great respect for our flag. A tattered flag gets on my last nerve, but I would almost rather see a tattered flag waving in the breeze than to see an empty flagpole.

We bank at US Bank in Pleasant View, and it has been bothering me that their flag pole has been empty for quite awhile. I drive past the bank every day on my way to and from work, and that pole standing there with no flag waving in the breeze just glares at me. I had to make a deposit the other day, and before I left the drive-through, I asked the teller why they didn’t have a flag.

I could tell the question kind of took her aback; she looked over her shoulder and from side to side (don’t know who or what she thought she’d find there) and then kind of stammered “Well, we used to have one. When we had that wind storm, it got all torn up so we took it down. We just haven’t replaced it yet.” Last wind storm I recall was back in early January or thereabouts. I just looked her in the eye and said “y’all really need to get a flag and start flying it every day.” She kind of cleared her throat and said “Yeah, I guess we do.”

I went to US Bank’s website and submitted a “customer comment” which I’ve copied and pasted here:

Comment or Question

I bank at the Pleasant View, TN branch of USBank. This may not seem important to y’all in the grand scheme of things, but it disturbs me that they have an empty flag pole in front of the bank. The flag got tattered in a wind storm, well over a month and a half ago, and was taken down. It has never been replaced. It makes me wonder if they are too lazy to replace the flag, are they fit to keep an eye on my money? I have a flag pole in my front yard, and it ALWAYS has a flag on it. When one gets tattered, it is promptly replaced with a fresh new MADE IN THE USA flag. Show a little pride and respect…

I figured that would be the end of it, but this afternoon I got this e-mail back:

Dear Tracy E. Roberts,

Thank you for using U.S. Bank’s online services to contact us.

On behalf of U.S. Bank, please accept my sincere apology regarding this situation.

Please know I have personally contacted the District Manager Tracy Brown for the Pleasant View branch in regards to your email. She has advised me she will address the situation immediately and contact you directly in regards to this matter.

We appreciate you notifying us about this situation, and we truly value your concerns.

If you have any other questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us in the future.

Thank you for choosing U.S. Bank. We sincerely appreciate your business!

Sincerely,

Ross Wineinger

Now I suppose we just wait and see…will there be a flag on display at US Bank on my way home this afternoon? Or perhaps not until tomorrow?  I can tell you this much, if there is not one by Monday, Jack is closing our accounts at US Bank and choosing another bank to do business with. (In case you wondered, Monday is the magic day because he’s taking the day off to tend to other business, and it will be handy for him to take care of bank stuff too if necessary.)  I’ll let y’all know how it goes…