Scotiabank

Regretfully I had to deal with Jade, Senior Financial Advisor, who dropped the ball our mortgage application. She was very slow and required following up. We requested to speak to Abdel, Branch Manager, who was unfortunately not present at the branch. A staff member at the branch admitted he doesn’t know where he left or when he will be back so he took our number and promised Abdel would call back that same day or the following day at the latest. Unfortunately Abdel, the Branch Manager, never had the decency to call us back or apologies for not calling us back after we specifically insisted that our matter was urgent and needed his attention immediately. It is very unfortunate that Abdel was useless and unprofessional to us for not following up. I don’t recommend this branch due to our terrible experience.

Worst service in my whole banking experience. Had a simple question about my mortgage. The so called “mortgage advisor”, I think named Elene, was searching for the formula and learning it while am at her desk. She printed the formula and asked me to do it at home. I was so polite and I figured out she is kinda embarrassed so I told her let’s calculate it together. At the end she gave me the help desk number and asked me to call them. So I left and I did that. The support team was very clear that this is a branch duty and she should have never done that. So she asked me to call the branch manager Mr Abdel Ali. I called Ali, left a message and sent an email. He replied that he will address my question in 24 hours. At the 24 hours I sent him a reminder. No answer. I called and left another voicemail. No answer. He did not reply at all. I had to figure out something and take my own decision based on my own advise to myself.

Terrible service. Actually no service. Staff flies by the seats of their pants. Brain dead. Branch manager doesn't even call back. Abdel Ali is mgr apparently. Left him 4 to 5 messages and no call backs. Very bad. Not impressed. Embarrassingly amateurish. Jade another representative is not helpful at all. Useless.

Made me feel extremely uncomfortable as they treated me like a second rate citizen, all but accusing me of fraud. Required me to get a verified check so there wouldn’t be any holds, only to not accept the verified check or receipt. I came to this Scotia after an unpleasant experience at another, only to be accosted for this having been my first time at this location. This bank holds true to the Scotia standard of horrible customer service. I won’t name names in this report but the one going to the president of the company will have them. I’d urge you not to experience this for yourself.

Wow. The Branch manager and front reception are great. The new management are great so I'm changing my review. They are on top of my issues now.

Unfortunately I have to agree with the general consensus regarding just how terrible the customer service is here. My wife and I have had a joint mortgage with Scotiabank for nearly a decade and my wife has been a Scotiabank customer since she was a little kid (+20 years). This seems to have absolutely no bearing on how we're treated and valued as customers as we've been through 6 mortgage specialists in 6 years and every time we've had to meet with our advisor it's been like pulling teeth and learning how to ride a bike for the first time over and over again. Getting a preferred rate is exceedingly difficult and if you are fortunate enough to get a slight discount, it won't be much more than 0.05% off their "best" rate. Their advisors are generally non-responsive and it takes multiple follow-ups just to confirm receipt of documentation. When push comes to shove and a difficult conversation needs to take place, such as asking why critical information wasn't previously explained to us, we're confronted with a level of defensiveness that leaves us feeling like we're in an "us against them" kind of relationship with our bank.

It baffles me how with a 2.5/5.0 review on Google, multiple complaints to the Branch Manager and phone conversations with the general customer service line, that this branch is still in business and, presumably, is still turning a profit. If I took 3 or 4 business days to get back to my clients and did nothing after receiving constructive feedback on how to improve my client interaction skills, I would be out of business and out of a job.

If you're looking for one of the big banks to manage your mortgage, I strongly suggest you avoid Scotiabank at all costs and save yourself the repeated headaches and babysitting.