Umpqua Bank

I had an amazing experience with Laura, Brian, and the folks at Umpqua getting a home equity loan.
As background, in 2015, I was in the uncomfortable place of having a substantial amount of high-​interest, unplanned for debt that I wanted to consolidate via a lower-​interest home equity loan. I spent several degrading months with Bank of America sending them easily 100 pages of paperwork and documentation (either by 1980s FAX, or an online secure doc system that was a nightmare to use). Finally, they kept declining for reasons they couldn’t specify, after wasting months of my time.
I gave up and resigned myself to paying dramatic debt interest for a year (despite my having a reasonable income and substantial home equity). My accountant recommended trying a small bank, like Umpqua, before giving up. I did.
Umpqua was indeed night and day different. For one thing, instead of dealing with BOFA’s nightmarish secure doc system that didn’t work and wasted hours of my time, I could just walk over and drop off the papers. As a local bank, they were better able to understand and evaluate local home equity than I felt Bank of America could. And they offered the loan a few weeks later, saving me thousands of dollars in interest payments.
In contrast, Umpqua was just a humanizing experience. I would never go back to a large bank again.

This has to be the worst customer service I have ever experienced. Emma was rude and condescending. I prefer respect to free coffee and cookies. They claim to be different in their approach to customer service and their focus on the community, which would be quite admirable if it was true. The past two years has been one disappointment after another. My suggestion, if you are listening Raymond P. Davis: use the money you spend on decorating and free food and invest in training for your employees on communication, respect, and integrity if you want to truly be the world’s greatest bank. From my experience, you are actually the world’s worst bank. Dressing your bank up to look appealing and providing free wifi, cookies, chocolate, and coffe may draw in new customers but you will not retain these customers by hiring incompetent and disrespectful employees like Emma. I prefer humane treatment to cookies.

After 25 years in Hawaii, we sold our condo and moved to Seattle.
Being stupid with money we wandered into the bank, we live just upstairs, and asked for help. Boy, did we receive help from them, Brian was fantastic, and guided us to an equally fantastic CPA. Stacey is also fantastic.
There’s coffee, computers, books, magazines, newspapers and displays of local businesses.
We are moving down to Long Beach, Ca. and they even found a comparable bank for us two blocks from our new apartment.
The gang at Umpqua rocks. We will miss them.

What an awesome bank! Transparent rates and services, and they don’t gouge on fees. Experienced absolutely wonderful customer service from an employee named Brian, as well as every other employee I’ve spoken with. To top it off, free treats on Friday and free coffee every day! They also have quite a few community events. This is one of the best banks I’ve ever used.

For years, my family has experienced Umpqua Bank. Their namesake is from an American Indian tribal named from communities in and North of the Oregon locations to Washington State. This bank is can likely be known as the «people’s bank» since they are interested in assisting the people’s businesses as in «small business» and supporting community activities with reasonable caution.
If you have read through the other reviews, it really shows and is proactive into business and financial ways to grow communities. This is the same process that has saved rural communities throughout Oregon for years. I have been observing this since I have family ties travelling from California to Oregon’s Roseburg, Myrtle Creek, Salem and beyond. For years, those communities from Douglas County, Oregon to Bellevue, Seattle and points North can get more financial assistance than the other difficult routes to growing communities while other banks are sitting on their hands. America could stand to learn from Umpqua Bank. Please read on–

To start off, I haven’t experienced their banking services at all. I’m reviewing them solely on their presence in the Capitol Hill neighborhood.
When they moved in, instead of advertising, Umpqua held a contest to donate money to a worthy neighborhood cause. What a great idea!
Also, they have a very nice lounge area with refreshments and free internet access open to the general public. Sometimes I stop in there for a cup of coffee on my way to work.
Having moved to a credit union a while ago, I swore off banks. However, the folks at Umpqua might make me reconsider. If I find that my current credit union isn’t meeting my needs, they’re at the top of my list.

This is not just a friendly branch but the staff is extremely competent and helpful. Changing banks can be such a hassle but not with Stacey and her crew. I was a banker myself for many, many years so I know banks. I highly recommend this one.

Holy cow! What a fantastic bank! And I don’t even have an account with them (yet!). The Capitol Hill is a large branch and they allowed my meetup group have a gathering there!
I highly recommend them! This is one fantastic neighborhood bank!

Is there a way to rate Umpqua Bank in the negative? I went in over the weekend to open an account and seemed to be bothering the three people working behind the counter. I asked about opening long term savings account for my daughter’s education fund. Two of the people literally walked away and the girl behind the counter was so condescending, it was beyond rude. I don’t know if it was because I went in with my child and they were annoyed… the whole experience was uncomfortable! They certainly were not busy. I wanted to open up an educational savings account for my daughter and niece and was told they could only offer me a regular savings account that I could transfer when they turned 18. which is weird because on their website is talks about the ESA account
The whole reason I decided to go in to Umpqua is because the press I saw about them supporting local community… but the way I was treated is contrary to their mission. I looked at the Children’s Theatre display in the lobby and left and opened an account at Chase down the street where I was treated like a customer and not an inconvenience. They can manage my money for the next 18 – 20 years.
The place was nice… people not so much.

Have been very happy with their services. I was with no Bank of America. Granted my switching was due to an impending divorce. The only complaint I have and it is minor. Sometimes they have computer issues (it seems) and something like getting a safe deposit box can take 45 minutes. Perhaps that is normal, I am not an expert.
But I will say, they are always professional. Great coffee, chocolate and internet access. Too bad more banks don’t follow their business model. I for one hope they are here to stay. I will be staying with them.

They have a qoute from John Cage on the wall for goodness sakes! End of last year I got so disgusted with the magabamks desire to become Goldman Sachs I went on a hunt to find an oldtime bank.
I had been with BOA since they bought Seafirst and I actually had no problems with thier services, except they refused to do a mobile on-​line banking app.
So after looking around I also decided that I did need a full service bank rather then a credit union I decided on Umpqua.
I can report after 6 months I love these guys. For example today I go on and was going to order some checks. The woman at the counter asked how many I use and I said almost none, I do mostly transfers and on-​line bill paying. So she say «just let me print you a couple more sheets»
So rather then pay the fee to the printing house I walked out with all the checks I will need till end of summer.
I know a lot of what they are doing is marketing, with the espresso machine and cake but they really are focusing on customers instead of trading on Wall Street.