JetStream FCU branch in Carolina, Puerto Rico. Image taken Friday, Sept. 22, 2017Jeanne Kucey, president/CEO of the $196 million JetStream Federal Credit Union released the following statement to CU Times regarding the status of their Carolina, Puerto Rico branch location:
“We have been in contact with our employees in Puerto Rico except one. We have not been able to reach her as of yet. Our branch manager has been in contact with us daily, fortunately she has AT&T as a provider and that seems to be the only carrier working. As you may know, communication on the island has been very poor. Everyone is as well as can be expected under the circumstances. No one has power, most don’t have running water, some have experienced severe flooding in their homes but all in all everyone is safe and unharmed.
For our members in Puerto Rico, since the entire island does not have power, we are waiving all fees until the end of the month. We’ve gone back and reviewed any fees that were charged as of Monday and we are refunding those as well. We are working on a special loan program for the members, but we are still gathering data and will have more information by next week.
As for our branch, I’ve attached a picture that was taken from the other side of the road as access was not available at that time. Today, our manager was able to go inside the building and we are happy to report that it suffered very little damage, our branch office has no damage inside or out and as you can see our logo is still on the top of the building! Our manager said she let out a little cry at the sight of the building as she thought for sure it had tumbled. We are waiting on the building owners to see if they can get the generator working by this weekend. We should have a better idea on Monday as to when we can re-open the branch.”
CU Times has reached out to multiple sources and credit union organizations since Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico on Wednesday. Due to the loss of power on the island, there has been very little communication coming from Puerto Rico regarding the status of credit union employees and damage to branch locations.
We will continue to update the story as we find out more information.
