Bank of Hawaii Kona Branch in Kailua-Kona, HI

I've been doing business with BOH for a number of years and though I recall a few minor incidences making me angry (at the time), overall, I cannot complain..... As a former businessman for some 50 years conducting personal & business matters in Germany, England and throughout the US Mainland I'm aware such things DO happen on occasion; hence, overall BOH gets the grade of B ... while I continue 'Business as usual' ! P.S. .. I even hold BOH shares of stock.... ALOHA !

My experience with Bank of Hawaii in Kailua-Kona at the Target location just now was terrible. Granted, it's more about the people than the institution... I guess. It was so opposite from the way my bank (Simple Bank) treats me, I was in total shock. They told me to provide documentation to complete a transaction, which I did. Then they went back on their word and reneged, saying the exact documentation they had requested from me was insufficient to complete the transaction. I ended up waiting around 40 minutes only to be told they couldn't help me, after they said they could. It was the manager in charge at the time. She is everything that is wrong with the banking industry. Also, it's ironic they call themselves "Bank of Hawaii" because there was NO Aloha in the room. Pray for the wicked.

OK, look. NO ONE likes banks. Of any kind. They can be frustrating, bureaucratic and slavish to a set of internal rules only a wizard could decipher. All this and they have your money, too. Given the above, the only saving graces for such institutions are the people they hire. It's just easier to accept the cod liver oil dispensed by these monoliths if you can at least see that the person you are dealing with is intelligent and human. So far all the people I've interacted with at the Kona Commons Branch of Bank of Hawaii have been remarkably nice. Assuming most people feel about banks as I do, that's no easy chore. To maintain a pleasant disposition when every customer is as grumpy as me, well, that takes a certain kind of person rarely encountered. So kuddo's to the hiring managers, they've done well for this branch. Nice people are, well, nice. But it's when you have to deal with an issue of complexity, outside the norm, that banks are the worst. Because every person you encounter can only spew out the rule for their own little piece of procedural real estate, something that is outside the box just completely outside their view. I can accept that if I'm then allowed to explain my problem to a higher level, but most often you just run into some bizarre protective layer that prevents any escalation. I recently had to solve a problem that was self inflicted. I'd accidentally e-deposited the same paycheck twice. The fallout of that created a series of inter-bank events that ended with me having been debited twice. So I was out the entire amount of the check. There were 3 banks involved, and 2 of them could only spew out as I've delineated above. The primary bank (not BOH) proceeded for three weeks to give me conflicting instructions and broke every promise made for resolution. Now this is where I can laud, not only the pleasantness, but also the intelligence of the staff at this branch. After several weeks of frustration, and after mistreatment and misdirection from banks no.1 and 2, I ended up in the lobby of BOH Kona. They were really only peripherally associated with the problem, but they were my last best hope. To my utter astonishment, I was immediately given access to a manager. She was very nice but more importantly (to me) she quickly grasped the situation. She explained that she'd have to spend some time researching and contacting the other players, which I expected, so I left my contact information and said I'd check back in a couple days. I never even made it home before she called me again. Not to blow me off or say there was nothing she could do. To tell me that the money would be in my account with BOH the next day! Amazing. So this lengthy narrative is meant to praise and thank Alisha Kamanawa, the MPC Manager and Officer for the Kona Money Processing Center. I do hope BOH knows and appreciates the asset she is. She was able to intelligently grasp, and then creatively solve a fairly complex issue. And quickly, to boot. Look, people (me) and institutions make mistakes. I've always found that, not the mistake, but the manner of fixing it that tells the story of character. In this case, and assuming that BOH can keep up the clearly high standards found with their branch personnel, I'd like to endorse this branch wholeheartedly. If you find yourself having to deal with a complex banking dilemma, your going to be treated like a person and with intelligent understanding. If you don't know, that's pretty rare.

I like Bank of Hawaii for their online banking features. I would say that's why really sets them apart.

Really great place to come to get a cash advance when you're in town we also have a currency exchange doing wan as well as yen