Big Banks to Try Putting on Lipstick

LipstickThe Financial Services Roundtable, which lobbies on behalf of around 100 of the country's top banks, credit card companies and insurance firms, will undertake a professionally-organized public relations campaign to try to improve the tarnished image of the financial industry. The campaign will portray the industry as trustworthy and positive, and is scheduled to start at the same time the mid-term election season ramps up. Three major PR firms are leading the campaign: APCO Worldwide (which has done work for the tobacco industry, Luntz, Maslanski Strategic Research (formerly headed by discredited pollster Frank Luntz), and the DDB Advertising company. The campaign will focus on setting up a Web site and working through other social media, like Facebook and Twitter, to try and demonstrate the "positive benefits" the industry brings to consumers lives and the economy. A Bloomberg National Poll found that about 56 percent of Americans would support government action to limit the compensation of financial employees who helped cause the global financial meltdown, or to even ban those people from working in the industry.

Comments

My law practice consists mainly of bankruptcies and foreclosures and I deal with the various banks on a daily basis to assist my clients who are in foreclosure. Sometimes the homeowner wants the bank to modify her loan; sometimes just to give the home back to the bank and be relieved of the mortgage obligation.

From my experience, generally, banks are less than cooperative when it comes to negotiating directly with the homowner. That is why I assist my clients to request an in court mediation after they go into foreclosure. Here the negotiations are done in-court instead of directly between the homeowner and the bank. Also, the attorneys for the homeowner works directly with the attorney for the bank. I have found this procees much less cumbersome and more successful. From my experience, most states have some form of foreclosure mediation program. I would advise homeowners in foreclosure to check this out.

Thank you for sharing this valuable information. My question to you..."What about those individuals/families that can't afford a lawyer. What options do you see for them?"

While I appreciate your helping us, I do have to point out that you are not commenting on the issue raised, but instead, are advertising your services (the services of a lawyer). Are you a lobbyist for the BAR association or the banking industry?

The article is alerting us to the coming PR circus that will soon go viral. Please keep your comments on topic and your advertising/pr to conventional outlets.

Hey....why are a group of bankers joined for a common cause proudly called a "lobby" while a group of workers are denigrated as "unions"?

Call a run on BigBanks! Pull your cash out and put it into a local bank or better yet, a credit union (where YOU are a member, not a customer). Check out www.moveyourmoney.info (<---not .org... ---> .INFO) for a list of local banks in your area. Local banks lend locally, trans-national banks suck the money out of communities and use their power against the people!

It's not the damned employees. It's the f***ing tycoons! It has all been preplanned. Is the world f***ing daft!?!?