After Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, I tried repeatedly to find my mortgage company, Citywide Mortgage, so that I could make arrangements for payments to continue.  Their phone did not work and the page of mortgage companies displaced by Hurricane Katrina contained only "unable to locate" for over 2 months after Katrina.  Finally one day I noticed that my September mortgage check had been cashed, and I called the company.  I was told they had relocated to Picayune MS, and I left a message for them to call me.  Approximately a week later I called again and left another message.  A few days later I called the Picayune number again and got information on how to handle my mortgage.

A few days later I got an insurance settlement check on my Hurricane Katrina damage which was made out to the mortgage company and me.  I spoke to Michael O'Keefe who laid out an easy way of handling the funds.  I FedEx'ed the check to Citywide, and called them on the day it arrived.  I requested that contrary to the included letter's instructions that I would like to pay for overnight shipping for the returned proceeds.  Michael O'Keefe agreed to that without hesitation, and transferred me over to Shirley who stated that she would be sending out the funds in 48 hours.  She agreed to overnight DHL the check to me at the address of my mortgage property.

I called Citywide Mortgage on the day the DHL package should have arrived to get the DHL tracking number.  I was told by the receptionist that Shirley was not in, but that the receptionist would attempt to locate the tracking number.  She called back to say that she could not find the tracking number; I requested that she contact Shirley.  She called back again to say that the package had not been picked up on time, and therefore it would not arrive until the next day.  I told Shirley that I had no problem with anything except that I should have been notified so as not to have to rearrange someone else's schedule to wait for the DHL delivery on the wrong day.  I asked to speak to Michael O'Keefe.  MO called and indicated that he had heard that I was upset about a late package.  I clarified to him that I understood that DHL was not under his control, but that it would have been appreciated if someone had notified me of when to wait for the package.  He then stated that the lesson was NOT to use overnight couriers and to stick with the US Postal Service as was their policy.  I should have reminded him (but I did not) that I did not ask him to break policy AND that the US Postal Service is not operational in New Orleans and barely so in Baton Rouge; also he had agreed to the overnight courier without hesitation.  Mr O'Keefe stated that he could not call everyone about late packages, but I reminded him that I had made a call, his personnel had made at least 2 calls, and here he was making a third call because his organization did not make that ONE call to update me on the late status of the pick-up and delivery.  He stated something to the effect that he and his organization were very busy at this time.  I informed him that he was implying that his affairs were more important than my own.

The tracking number that I was given by Citywide was not entered into the DHL system until late that day.  Not very surprisingly, the tracking system indicated that the package was being sent to my temporary Baton Rouge mailing address  which was contrary to my verbal instructions to Shirley.  Ironically if the package had been sent at the time that was originally specified by Shirley, the package would have arrived the day when I was in Baton Rouge anyway.  Due to the delay I would either have to have it resent from Baton Rouge to New Orleans, or I will have to pick it up (a 2 hour round trip.)

At this point I'm not sure I should trust this organization with my mortgage, but I probably do not have much choice unless I refinance at a higher rate with someone else.

Resolution

I will drive to Baton Rouge and waste more time due to the incompetence, poor ethical standards, and arrogance of Citywide Mortgage of Picayune MS.  I will also investigate the possibility of a different mortgage company.