Why Chase Bank Sux

 I just got off the phone with Chase Bank regarding my business checking account with them.  It appears that I am overdrawn $104.00 because of a $24 check.  How so much?  Follow their logic...

I had a $24.00 check that bounced so they return it and tag me $35 for NSF.    

Account Balance: -$35.00

Get this, THE SAME CHECK comes back two days later and they pay it!  Of course they assess me ANOTHER $35 NSF charge PLUS the cost of the $24 check.

New Account Balance:  -$94

The best part is that when you have a negative balance with Chase, they charge you a DAILY NSF charge of $5 per day per account!

Account Balance: -$104

What's even MORE remarkable about this story is that last month Chase pinged me for $570 in service fees because of my ATM card.  Each time I purchased a $1 Coke, Chase would pay the Coke and then charge me $35 NSF PLUS the $5 daily fee.  In a week I was minus $570 for $10 worth of Cokes.  To their credit, they did refund me $360.  Dreamy huh?

Needless to say, we are DONE with Chase Bank and closing our account tomorrow.  Chase was convenient because it was around the corner.  We have been with Cyprus Credit Union for six years now and we LOVE them.  They are great people and have been very fair and friendly.  I realize that Congress has agreed to bail these big banks out, no one told me that I was personally responsible for bailing out my local branch.  Perhaps I should start charging THEM $5 per day for each day I keep them open!

The Holy War

There was a time in my life when I was a HUGE BYU fan. My dad worked as an usher at most of the BYU basketball and football games which meant that I got to see a lot of them growing up as a kid. I still have a lot of memories of those times. In Basketball my favorite player is Danny Ainge. My favorite number to this day is 22 because that was his jersey number and I wanted to be just like him. I also remember Keith Rice, Greg Kite, Fred Roberts and the rest of them. After the games when my dad was hustling people out of the Marriott Center I would go down by the locker room and try to get an autograph or two. In one game, well before tip off I went down onto the floor and rebounded balls for Ainge. It was a thrill.

Football wasn't any different. I grew up with Gifford Nielsen, Marc Wilson, Clay Brown, Via Sikahema, Steve Young, Jim McMahon and Ty Detmer. BYU sports was my life, and as a young kid in Orem, Utah I wanted to one day play for them. We moved to Iowa in 1983 and in 1984 BYU became NCAA Football National Champions. I was elated! I took some ribbing in school as I was the only "Mormon Boy" but I was genuinely happy that they had pulled it off. If you had been a fan as long as I was, you knew full well the ups and downs of each season. The sweet victories, the bitter defeats, when you lived and died with each play you feel entitled to claim part of that trophy as your own.

All of that changed when I moved back to Utah in 1993. I was anxious to resume my loyalties and listened intently to Paul James call the BYU-Utah game. After years of getting routed, the Utes won a close and exciting 34-31 game and BYU finished the season 6-6. The KSL call in show was a shock for me as fan after fan questioned Lavelle Edwards for his play calling. As a life long fan I was disgusted with how "spoiled" these fans had become and the inexcusable way they were getting after a BYU coach who had brought the program from the dead to a National contender. I still remember the fan who said "I've been a BYU season ticket holder for 15 years and I'm not buying next year. I will not be a part of a program that doesn't win." Obviously this guy wasn't around for those times when we would have been grateful for a 6-6 season.

So after years and years of listening to BYU fans whine and complain and Monday morning quarterback an extraordinary coach I decided that I had had enough. Aside from the fact that I have lived in Salt Lake City for 14 years now and always support the local teams (Real Salt Lake, The Bees, the Buzz, and finally the Jazz) I decided to cheer for the Utes. Unlike BYU fans, they genuinely seemed to enjoy every win, probably because of years and years of being a cellar dweller. Most of all, Ute fans don't WHINE the way BYU fans do!

So that is the reason that my loyalties have changed. Is BYU an excellent school? Of course it is. Except for my brother and I, EVERYONE in my family AND their spouse is a BYU graduate! I will always believe that BYU offers a great education. On the flip side, can you get a great education at Utah? Of course, the medical school alone is one of the most prestigious in the Country. Is BYU the ONLY place to get an education? Absolutely not! There are plenty of great universities out there, each offering it's own specialty.

But at the end of the day I love cheering for the Utes. It's impressive to me that kids who grew up all along the Wasatch Front can come together as a team and take on powerhouse football programs from the Big Ten, Pac Ten, Big East and ACC and beat them as good as anyone. Congrats to the 2008 Utah Utes and with some luck I hope to watch you play in your second BCS game!

Inconvenience Is The Mother Of All Invention

Aside from Exxon and the Saudis, I'm probably the only guy in the US who is thrilled with these outrageous gas prices. If it was up to me I'd push gas prices even higher as I don't think that there is enough pain at the pump yet. $10 per gallon would be perfect.

No, I'm not a masochist and no, I don't own any oil stocks either. I'm just a regular American who is sick and tired of being held hostage by foreign countries from the Middle East, Russia and Venezuela. Nothing would make me happier than to see all of them sit on tankers full of oil that are virtually worthless. I strongly believe that we are getting there.

Inconvenience is the mother of all invention. Think about all of the historical achievements the world has produced over the years. Fire, the wheel, cars, computers, airplanes. Almost all of them born in an effort to solve some kind of inconvenience, some kind of pain. Using that same model, it stands to reason that being held hostage to these outrageous gas prices will encourage someone, ANYONE to invent a way to get us off of our addiction to foreign oil. It has.

This summer, Funding Universe has been approached by a number of companies, both big and small who are working on this exact problem. Some are working on bio fuels, others on solar power or wind power. We recently worked with a company that developed a product that harnessed wind power from the ocean and converted it into transportable energy. It has been exciting to see the thought, calculations and designs that have been created by each of these companies and my only regret is that we don't have more. Yes sir, a throbbing pain can move a lot of things, including a nation.

Joel Nielsen is a Venture Consultant at Funding Universe and can be emailed at jnielsen@fundinguniverse.com

Live Pitch a HUGE Success

Last week Funding Universe hosted a "Live" Pitch event on the Novell campus in Provo, Utah. Five companies were selected to present their products and services to a panel of six investors and business experts. Approximately 150 spectators attended the two hour event.

Live Pitch was born from another Funding Universe event called "Speed" Pitching. "Speed" Pitching is similar to speed dating. In speed pitching, ten screened businesses meet in a room filled with 30-50 investors. The goal for business owners is to pique the interest of Angel and Venture Capitalist for future funding. For the Entrepreneur they get the undivided attention of 30-50 investors and the investors benefit because they can be introduced to 10 vetted businesses through Funding Universe in less than two hours.

Businesses are allowed four uninterupted minutes to present their venture. They then have three minutes to answer questions and bing bam boom they are done. Four minutes is not a lot of time to explain an entire business, so the pitches have to be precise, thorough and engaging. Many businesses who have participated in our "Speed" Pitch event have asked Funding Universe if they could watch a Speed Pitch before participating in one. Alas, "Live" Pitch was born.

Last week the five qualifying businesses screened to present were

ListPipe, a new SEO company focused on providing custom content through an online subscription service.

Izatt International, a local development group focusing on iPhone applications.

Gruvie, a social utility that enables you to wrangle all your social networking accounts into a single login.

Lignin Bio Fuels, an alternative fuel company that produces transportation fuel out of non-edible biomass.

Estamar Strategy, a consulting group managing business investment opportunities

After presenting, the audience was allowed to invest $200 in "FU Funny Money" into any of the five companies. The audience in conjunction with the six panalists produced the top two companies. The two "Live" Pitch winners were Ian Ellis of Gruvie and Cary Snowden of ListPipe. (In a bit of unbiased reporting, I would like to point out that I only had one client in the competition and he won)

Our next Speed Pitch event will be on October 24th at the Larry H Miller Campus in Sandy, Utah. We invite you to come out and see how Funding Universe facilitates the interface of Small Businesses with Angels and VC's.

Joel Nielsen is a Venture Consultant at Funding Universe and can be contacted at jnielsen@fundinguniverse.com