By Tom Hamburger

June 30, 2009

Reporting from Washington — Gabby Ornelas, a former teller at the giant Bank of America Corp., remembers the training sessions. And she remembers her marching orders: “Sell, sell, sell.”

Ornelas was instructed to use her Spanish language skills and Latina heritage to sign up customers for as many kinds of banking services as possible, she said — services that led to lucrative fees for the bank and financial entanglement for many customers.

“We were coached every day to push multiple checking accounts, credit cards and debit cards even when the customer didn’t understand how to use them,” said Ornelas, who lives in Landover Hills, Md., a town with a large immigrant population and a per-capita income of less than $19,000.

In one case, she described a Central American mother of three who came back to see her at the bank, distressed about $300 in overdraft fees incurred after Ornelas persuaded the woman to open a second checking account.

Ornelas and eight of her colleagues leveled the accusations in recent interviews. They are being backed in their whistle-blowing by the Service Employees International Union, which is trying to organize BofA, the nation’s largest bank.

Bank of America officials flatly rejected the allegations, saying their policies are legal, adhere to industry standards and are helpful to customers, including immigrants seeking a toehold in the United States.

“Bank of America believes the SEIU’s claims misrepresent the bank’s relationship with its customers and its associates,” said Anne Pace, a bank spokeswoman.

The former workers said they were going public to lay out what they saw as a little-known side of BofA’s business model: encouraging working-class customers to sign up for high-interest-rate credit and cash advance services and structuring an array of check and debit card services to maximize overdraft fees and other charges.

The campaign will be launched publicly this week, with workers scheduled to tell their stories in news conference calls and meetings with members of Congress. The union is seeking to pressure the bank and to build support for legislation now stalled in the Senate that would make it easier for union members to organize.

Bank of America said that the former employees are a disgruntled minority and that internal surveys show that most employees of the company are overwhelmingly satisfied.

Other critics of SEIU said the union might have a conflict of interest because it has outstanding loans with the bank.

Many of the workers speaking out were fired from the bank, most before they took their complaints public. One worker has said her firing was related to her interest in the union. One worker is still employed at BofA.

BofA’s Pace said that all of the bank’s activities are not only legal but also useful to consumers, particularly those who have recently arrived in the U.S.

“We believe a checking account is the cornerstone to establishing financial security in this country,” Pace said in an e-mail. “We offer innovative financial services to meet the needs of all of our customers, including Hispanic customers.”

Pace also said the bank had taken steps to help customers facing “financial challenges.” For example, she said, the bank waives certain monthly fees for customers who have lost their jobs and has reduced penalty fees for customers who overdraw their accounts by less than $5.

Although BofA denies wrongdoing, it recently paid $35 m