“(As an immigrant), the rules sometimes don’t protect us, we fall between the cracks, and they don’t apply to us or protect us and cover us.”
We love our work, but sometimes, the day-in and day-out sameness can make even awesome people lose sight of why we do what we do.
That is until someone tells us that Simplicity changed their life.
That’s exactly what happened to Mandi in our Call Center recently. She was so overwhelmed when the call ended that she called her friends in Marketing to share the story.
Here’s how it went:
A Simplicity member who lives out of state called for some basic info about a check she deposited through our app. Mandi took a little extra time to explain some of the tips and tricks she has picked up over the last four years on the team. During that conversation, Mandi commented that the member must be happy if she kept her account open after she moved away.
The member replied, “You’re all great. When my friends are complaining about their bank, I tell them I love my credit union, and I’ll never leave them.”
That’s the kind of feedback we love to hear, but Mandi didn’t expect what came next.
The member went on to say that she was an immigrant and her abusive ex-husband had destroyed all the paperwork, everything that proved who she was and that she could legally work in the United States, to keep her from leaving him.
Eventually, she did leave, with no idea how she would work and support herself and her children, and found refuge in a local shelter. While she was there, the shelter staff worked with her and the Simplicity Team to open a new account that was all her own.
That new account was part of her being able to save and build a life away from her abuser.
She went on to say, “The fact that you were willing to step out of your normal protocol and see me as a human being and interact with me as a human being…SAVED ME and enabled me to go on to live my life away from him and support my children and have a way to deposit the money I was making so that I could pay my bills and be self-sufficient.”
We help a lot of people every day, in big and small ways, but it’s always special to hear how finding a way through the red tape and toward an act of kindness can change someone’s life.
