Update: Chase set to rebrand area WaMu branches

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is in the final steps of converting local Washington Mutual branches to the Chase Bank brand.

Starting July 25, the computer systems of local Washington Mutual branches were merged with the Chase branches and on Aug. 10, the Chase Bank signs will go up at former Washington Mutual locations, according to Chase officials.

The changeover will give Chase 240 branches, up from 176 in the north Texas area and 66, up from 47, in Tarrant County.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. purchased Seattle-based Washington Mutual for $1.836 billion in September 2008 after Washington Mutual was closed by the Office of Thrift Supervision. In March 2008, JPMorgan purchase Bear Stearns for $236 million, which had a mortgage group in Lewisville.

“We have a group that has experience in merging systems,” said Danny R. Smith, chairman of the Fort Worth region for Chase. “The group is led by the same people that led the conversion in 2005 for Chase and Bank One, so they have plenty of experience.”

Beyond that, Chase is continuing to add new branches of its own, said Leanne Kurosky, market manager for retail banking.

“We’re opening five in Tarrant County this year,” she said. “Two have already opened and we have three more planned.”

Kurosky said a branch in north Fort Worth and Crowley have opened and the bank plans to open a location on Southwest Boulevard, in the Medical District and in Arlington.

With the addition of Washington Mutual, which also had a credit card call center in Arlington, and Bear Stearns, which had a mortgage group in Lewisville, Chase will have approximately 12,000 employees in the north Texas area, up from about 8,500.

“There have been some jobs eliminated, but overall, we’ve increased our employment in the area,” said Greg Hassell, a spokesman for Chase.

Smith said the merger with Washington Mutual has helped Chase overall by giving the bank access to new markets on the West Coast and Florida, where Chase had little, if any, presence.

“Washington Mutual was more of a consumer retail bank, so what we’ll do is come in and start overlaying our commercial bank and other products – trust and private banking, for instance – in those same markets. That is a tremendous opportunity for us in those areas of the county,” he said.

It has also given some area Chase employees the opportunity to take positions in other parts of the county, he said.

“We’ve got three people from the Fort Worth area that have raised their hands and they’re going to Oregon to be the new commercial bank part of those banks,” he said. “It’s a great opportunity for them to get involved at another level.”

 Chase has so far converted 7.6 million accounts in Florida, Georgia, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Texas and Illinois representing $40 billion in deposits, the New York-based financial institution announced July 31. Nearly 300,000 loan accounts with approximately $15 billion in balances were also converted to Chase systems.

The seven-state conversion is the second of three retail conversions to bring all former WaMu branches onto Chase's computer systems and under the Chase brand. By the end of the year, customers will have full access to 25 million checking accounts at any of more than 5,100 Chase branches and 14,000 Chase ATMs across the country, according to the bank.

The cost of the rebranding effort for Texas is estimated at $77 million and $750 million nationwide, according to bank officials.

rfrancis@bizpress.net