Back in April, McMillan Rifles’ Director of Operations reported that the Bank of America told him to drop dead [paraphrasing]. According to Ryan McMillan the company that bears his name was DOA with BOA because McMillan made firearms. The blowback may not have rocked the Bank to its core, but more than a few members of the gun rights community closed their BOA accounts in protest. Being a “why can’t we all just get along?” kinda industry lobby group, the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) contacted BOA and “insisted” on a response to Big Mac’s kvetch. Just under a month later, an NSSF email blast reveals the altogether surprising fact that . . .
the Bank of America says “nuh-uh.” First, a bit of tut-tutting from the NSSF . . .
As we noted in our original statement on this matter, we are aware that many members of our industry have had longstanding banking and business relationships with the Bank of America and had reported to us that they had not encountered any problems with the bank due to the fact that their business was in the firearms industry.
In a May 2, 2012, reply, the Bank of America said that though it could not comment on its relationship with customers, the company has not made changes to its policies.
“I want to assure you and your organization that we do not have a policy that would deny banking services to entities because they are in the firearms industry,” wrote Anne G. Pace in BOA’s letter.
As Aretha Franklin sang, Who’s Zooming Who? Kelly McMillan’s peeps said he’d call TTAG tomorrow to give us an official reply. Meanwhile, click here for McMillan’s interview on the subject.
Sounds like a bank who already has a PR problem is trying to backpedal as hard as possible to keep things from snowballing any farther.
BoA is the nearest and most convenient bank to me, with multiple branches along my route to work. But I still refuse to bank with them.
My reasons for not banking with BoA go well beyond their supposed refusal to service customers in the Firearms Industry. Their financials and business practices (particularly lending practices) alone are more than enough for me to give them a wide berth. Unfortunately, one aspect of my job requires me to make deposits to a BoA on a weekly basis. The employees are all very nice, but every time I am in there, they try to get me to open an account. Usually, I just politely decline and go about my business. Finally, several weeks ago, I told them as politely as I could why I did not wish to (and never would) open an account with them; my reasons ranging from the firearms issue to the company financials. They have not asked me again since.
A hummingbird could not stand on the reputation of the BOA – it’s that weak. My unsolicited advice? Join a pro gun credit union. Or in my case, pro gun and pro law enforcement.
When you store and spend your money, you are voting with your dollars. I’ll spend and store pro 2A wherever and whenever it is possible.
I rarely, if ever, make purchasing or business relationship decision based on the stated or unstated political policies of a business or institution. I make my decisions base on the merits of what is best for me. If I boycotted every business entity that clearly or apparently disagreed with my ideologies, I’d either starve or I’d have virtually no choices in life.
BTW, I’ve never done business with BoA, so I don’t know if they’re a good bank or a lousy bank and I have no incentive to find out. I’m satisfied with where I bank now.
Or those companies would go out of business and be replaced by reputable businesses. If we’d pay more attention to what’s going on in the country we wouldn’t have big-government, anti-Constitution Obama and big-government, anti-Constitution Romney as major party candidates for President. If we don’t give a damn then why should our elected representatives? If we don’t give a damn then what is to stop the president from starting a war without Congressional approval?
Is there a chance that this was one bank manager acting according to his personal beliefs? Not hard to imagine one bank manager who was a hard core anti-gun nutjob and going out acting vigilantly style against the evil manufactures of death.
Id like to see NSSF or TTAG interview the bank manager who is suposed to have said this….vers some national PR rep.
I was looking for a paticularly egregious BOA story I’d read a way back – a customer brought a check in and actually told the bank manager straight away that she didn’t entirely trust the check writer and could they verify it? They had her arrested.
Trying to find the story I Googled “Bank of America Customer Arrested” and found stories of a far more recent vintage claiming that there BOA customers trying to close accounts had police called on them!
I had to deal with BoA several years ago on a regular basis for a business account, and interfaced with them quite frequently to clear up an error (ours or theirs) or chase a bad check that we deposited. The times when that interface was a massive pain in the ass hassle FAR outnumbered the times that everything went smoothly. I wouldn’t ever put my personal accounts with them, simply because the thought of going through those hassles when it’s my money we’re dealing with is simply unacceptable.
I wouldn’t bank with BOA if they were the last bank on earth. I have many, many reasons, none of which I will go into here, but they are on my PERMANENT crap list.
Is there a list of “2nd amendment friendly” banks ?
I’ve been against banking with the big banks for many years because of their membership in the Federal Reserve and what that organization has done to our currency and how they dictate the monetary policy. Currently, I belong to two credit unions.
This is a GREAT thing for bipartisanship! Now gun owners can hate Bank of America just as much as everyone else, bringing us all closer together.
It’s really a very moving story. Or, maybe I just ate too much bran.
We’ve had a number of our Guns Save Life members who have discontinued their accounts at Bank of America.
At least one member, who owns a crop dusting business with a half-dozen planes, called his BoA office and they confirmed that the BoA company does not maintain accounts for firearm-related businesses.
He closed both his business and personal accounts a few days later after setting things up at another institution.
John
Can BofA explain why a VP named Ray Fox went to McMillan headquarters for an annual review? Seems pretty exceptional that a high corporate officer would proctor a normal meeting at this level. Why isn’t BofA mad at the McMillan group for business that hey are obviously losing? On one hand they claim not to be able to discuss client business but glady point out the business with the freedom group.
Isn’t this the same company that got caught robo signing foreclosures? Accepted billions of tax payers dollars? Aren’t their headquarters in Charlotte, NC, home of he Democratic convention, in a place called the Bank of America center? Maybe this is a bigger story. I remeber a recent story about a guitar company named Gibson that recently got raided for having imported wood while the other guitar manufacturers in the US that has purchased the same wood didn’t. The big difference is Gibson’s CEO is critical of the current administration in the executive branch. I am just saying that Chicago tactics can be exported in many different ways.
Ted, sorry but VP is not a high-ranking position. In virtually every large company (and BOA is one of the largest), everybody gets VP almost automatically if you’ve been there for 10 years or so. You don’t even have to be in a management position. That’s just how Corporate America works these days. Titles are handed out like gold stars… just another side-effect of the “Everybody Gets A Prize” preschool-friendly society we’re building…
As Rydak posted above, this was probably just some clown at a local branch overstepping his bounds. I think I read that BOA has something like 360,000 employees. You try riding herd on that many people!
where’s the follow up?? why has there not been more firearms industry clashes with B of A??? I’d like to see more information on this. I want to know who NOT to do business with B of A or McMillan!!
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