Inside Campus Partners

Annie Springs
April 2004

Annie Springs
Payment Processing Analyst

Annie Springs, Payment Processing Analyst, is one of the members in the “Thirty Year Zone,” an informal club for employees with over thirty years of service with our company. Annie was hired by Wachovia on May 15, 1972, and began working in Transaction Control in the student loans unit in 1978. Her first supervisor in the Control Unit was the legendary Anne-Marie Miller, who retired from our company in 2000 after a 30-year career in student loans. Annie credits Anne-Marie with giving her a good foundation in the Control area, which has served her well all of these years.

Annie has numerous responsibilities, but with her long-term experience, she handles them with ease. Foremost, Annie is responsible for processing payment transmittals from schools. Some borrowers make their loan payments directly to their schools, and Annie must balance the deposit with the payment transmittal. She also verifies that checks the company receives from loan consolidation companies match the payoff amount due on the loan. Sometimes during peak periods, she handles 45-60 loan consolidations a day. Once verified, she must send the checks to the our bank. She assists her supervisor, Paula Hall, in researching loan consolidation issues and dealing with over and under payments.

She also must see that all checks from borrowers, consolidation companies, or from customers are recorded, balanced, and filmed. She also researches payment issues at the request of Borrower Services or Customer Service. Her job is very demanding, and she must meet strict deposit deadlines each day. She never goes to lunch until her deposits are ready each day. The afternoons are not quite as stressful, but she still has plenty of work to keep her occupied.

She receives a lot of support from her co-workers. Ronye Blackburn, Paula Hall, Pat Hill, Janet Tuttle, Pat Spry, Ella Hallums, Jackie Shelton, Frankye Jones, and she have worked together for many years. “I know I am going to miss them when I retire,” said Annie. She also has highregard for Charles Parker, who is the Director of Customer Support, which includes her area. Charles has always promoted teamwork and helped design System III. She is continually impressed with his knowledge. “You don’t work for Charles and not learn something,” Annie commented.

Earlier in her career, she worked with new loans and advances and interacted with customers on a frequent basis. In particular, she fondly remembers working with Amanda Baker who still works at the University of Bridgeport.

Before coming to our company, Annie worked in Richmond,Va and here in Winston-Salem as an assistant buyer for a department store and as a receptionist in New York City in the early 1960s. Among the experiences that she will never forget are attending the World’s Fair and walking many miles to get home after the 1964 Blackout.  The day of the Blackout, she spent hours getting home.  She was working in Queens and had to go to Long Island where she lived with her sister.  The subway was not working, and she found herself walking with a woman, who lived in Brooklyn. The woman, who was a stranger, took Annie to Brooklyn on foot, where she could get directions from her husband to help Annie get to Long Island.  Annie ended up walking from Queens to Brooklyn to Long Island that night because all the buses were full, cabs were not going to Long Island because all the traffic signals and lights were out, and the trains were not running.   She finally caught a bus that had an empty seat, and arrived at home in Long Island at 2:00 AM in the morning.

When she is not working, she loves to decorate and watch HGTV. She likes to shop for each room and enjoys finding bargains whenever she can. She also enjoys listening to opera, and spending time with her family. Annie has a large extended family, which she sees at least once a year. Every Christmas, she and her 14 surviving brothers and sisters out of a family of 16 siblings, and their families get together in Winston-Salem, Richmond, or Rowland for a celebration. She cherishes these times, and the memories of growing up on a farm with her mother and father and all the children. She started working in the fields when she was five years old, but her parents “spoiled all of them to the bone with their love,” Annie reminisced.

Annie has two daughters. One has a masters in industrial engineering, and the other is the Assistant Dean of Student Affairs at Virginia Union University. Both of her daughters are urging her to finish her college degree, which she started at Barber-Scotia College, after she retires. Although Annie is not ready to retire, she is considering taking courses toward her degree. Whatever she chooses to do, it is a safe bet to say that she will be busy.