Palmetto Citizens Federal Credit Union
Palmetto Citizens Federal Credit Union is headquartered in Columbia and is the 7th largest credit union in the state of South Carolina. It is also the 349th largest credit union in the nation. It was established in 1936 and as of June of 2023, it had grown to 289 employees and 82,263 members at 15 locations. Palmetto Citizens Federal Credit Union's CD rates are 4X the national average, and it has a B+ health rating.
Field of Membership Restrictions
Membership in Palmetto Citizens Federal Credit Union is open to those who live, work, worship, or attend school in Calhoun, Fairfield, Kershaw, Lexington, Newberry, Orangeburg, Richland, or Saluda Counties in South Carolina. Immediate family of membership-eligible individuals also qualify. Businesses and non-profits, legal entities and churches operating in the area are also eligible for membership.
See current membership details
Great Credit Union
I’ve been with Palmetto Citizens since 2005 and have had nothing but great experiences. Love that their checking doesn’t require a minimum balance or charge any monthly fees. Also got a better rate than the dealership offered on my car loan. I tell all my friends around Columbia to check them out!
Top Notch Financial Instituion
Great service, low fees, better loan rates and great deposit rates.
Friendly Service
This bank has the friendliest people on earth. You feel like family when you walk in the door. They don't have an ATM machine on every corner like Bank of America but you can always use your debit card to get cash back at Wal-Mart or the grocery store. I love Palmetto Citizens!
Local credit union
This credit union is very pleasant to deal with in person. Their employees, both tellers and the account managers that I have interacted with have been helpful, kind and knowledgeable at every interaction. We have a single checking account and several savings accounts with them and my only complaint is the secondary person on the account can not authorize any account changes. I would like to be able to give permission for them to make changes without my presence, but that has not been an option. I've never had any unexpected fees and I find everything to be reasonable. The fees are minimal. The only reason I would consider leaving this credit union is their website interface. It doesn't work well with any of our money management applications and it is not intuitive to use at all. I have a difficult time putting my finger on what is so off-putting about the website and web interface but I find myself frustrated or irritated every time I need to use it.
Avoid This Bank
I moved from VA and was looking for another credit union to bank with. So my sister was a member and didn't have to many negative things to say about this financial institution. I decided I would join, well that was an ordeal within its self it took and act of congress for that to happen. I joined reluctantly and I've been a member since 2017. There customer service is okay but the fee's are ridiculous. The wonderful "Overdraft Protection fee is a lovely $24.50 each time. So you could go over your account by lets say $5 and you will be charged that fee. You would think that with all the clienttell that they service that this fee wouldn't be necessary especially if you have savings account that they could pull the funds from. I forgot to mention they do offer overdraft protection but your credit score determines whether you qualify for that service. This financial institution has been nothing more than a money get over, not to mention I don't think they wanted my business to start with. I'm a very dissatisfied customer. I 100% agree with the person who gave them a star which they don't deserve because even a 1 star is to much. Banking with Palmetto Citizens has been a nightmare. I hope to find another bank sooner than later.
Dishonest Bank
This is the worst bank I’ve ever been apart of, granted i haven’t been with many. I came from Bank of America, the reason for the transfer was simple: my sister was with this bank, WAS. She would tell me how she really liked the bank because of the money saving and CD plans, but would often complain about ooverdrafts. In my mind, I just thought perhaps she wasn’t smart with her money (which she is known for) and thought to give palmetto a try, to take advantage of the savings and CD plans she often spoke about.
During my 6 years with Bank of America, I only overdrated a total of about 3 times. And it usually happened during a night when I’d be out and about, had had too much to drink, and would continuously swipe my card out of incoheritance. I had been with palmetto citizens for 5 MONTHS and overdrafted a total of 15 Times. The first time I overdrafted, I thought, well maybe it was my fault, I’ll let it slide. The second time, I thought the same, the third time I thought this is getting ridiculous and made my way down to the same bank that I initially signed up at. The bank manager looked over my profile from her computer, and literally COULD NOT find where I had overdrafted at and how i had accumulated my overdraft fees. She even went as far as to call someone with a lesser title into the office to try to help her figure it out. Once neither one of them could figure it out (after counting the spent money on a calculator multiple times) she simply gave up, apologized, and refunded me the overdraft amount.
The next week, it happened again. I went back down to the same bank, this time, while the manager was nice, she didn’t refund the overdraft amount. She did try to investigate by asking me questions to try and figure out where I was going wrong. I told her that I was just as confused as she was and that i was keeping track of the money that I was spending via the palmetto citizens app, but that somehow, I was still managing to overdraft each week.
“Ohhh. That’s why” she finally said to me as if she’d had a bright idea. “You can’t go by the app. You see, the app isn’t always truthful. We give merchants a few days to get their money from you. If they don’t get the money within the allowed amount of days, the transaction disappears from your banking app. You won’t see it, and there will be absolutely no proof you ever even spent that money, unless you remember exactly where and when you spent it.”
“So basically you guys lie to your customers by hiding transactions from the app? Hoping that they’ll forget about the money they spent and then re-spend it, because ‘out of sight, out of mind’?” I responded.
She looked as if she wanted to say yes, but knew that she’d probably shouldn’t have. Instead she gave me some excuse about it not being the banks fault, and that I should write down all of my transactions to avoid this from happening in the future. I agreed and left, but in the back of my mind, I couldn’t shake the fact that I shouldn’t have to write down all of my transactions, because I didn’t have to do that with Bank of America. With B.O.A, I relied on my banking app to help me remember the amount of money I spent, because let’s face it, its 2018, and most of us rely on technology to get us through. The Bank of America banking app never lied or hid transactions from me, hoping that i would forget about them and then spent that money again to overdraft. It was always upfront and honest with what I spent and when.
Well anyway. I came up with the plan that I was going to go and withdraw all of my spendings every time I got paid, to avoid overdrafting, but that soon got old (though it was effective, I didn’t have to do that with Bank of America) finally, I just said I was going to let things go back to normal and leave my money in my account instead of withdrawing it. I remember calling the palmetto citizens customer service line, because some of my transactions had once again disappeared from the app, and i wanted to ask one of the girls if she had seen a possibility of me overdrafting, she wouldn’t give me an answer, and told me she couldn’t tell me about any of my transactions unless i called it by name (they WANT you to overdraft) The same week I did that, let things go back to “normal”, I overdrafted again.
Finally I was at work oneday, and I was complaining about my bank to my boss and how I hadn’t overdrafted a lot since joining. He asked what bank I was with, and when I told him, his eyes lit up like the Fourth of July.
“Ah man, I used to work for the customer service line of that bank. They’re pulling the wool over your eyes.” He then went on to tell me about how when he worked there, they were basically trained to ensure that you overdraft, because they know that many people rely on technology to get them through, and that’s why the company makes the transactions disappear from the app, so that you’ll forget about them. He then told me that they referred to Tuesday’s as “Overdraft Day” because that was when all of the hidden transactions popped up and took all of your money. He then told me, “if you want an honestly bank, go back to Bank Of America.”
Me and my sister both left, haven’t had any problems since.
Data as of Q2 2023
Learn why bank health mattersHealth Grade Components
| Overall | |
|---|---|
| NCUA # | 1472 |
| Year Chartered | 1936 |
| Employees | 289 |
| Primary Regulator | |
| Profit Margin | |
|---|---|
| Return on Assets - YTD | 1.4% |
| Return on Equity - YTD | 14.78% |
| Annual Interest Income | $22.5MM |
| Assets and Liabilities | ||
|---|---|---|
| Assets | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $1.31B$1.35B |
| Loans | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $743.1MM$639.4MM |
| Deposits | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $1.07B$1.11B |
| Equity Capital | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $123.9MM$117.7MM |
| Loan Loss Allowance | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $0$2.7MM |
| Unbacked Noncurrent Loans | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $4.2MM$3.9MM |
| Real Estate Owned | Q2 2023vs Q2 2022 | $0$0 |
