The North Carolina media got a taste of the “Blaine humor” this week in describing the difficulty consumers sometimes have in switching banks ala Bank Transfer Day.

Responding to a reporter's query, Jim Blaine, president/CEO of the nation's second-largest credit union, State Employees' CU of Raleigh, told the Winston-Salem Journal the bond between a financial institution and customers has always been hard to break because of technology and multiple accounts.

“More people would rather get a colonoscopy than change their financial institution,” he declared.

Meanwhile, along with the laughs, staffers at the $23 billion SECU were dealing with a surge of new account openings.

 “We got 25,000 in the last month and that's a doubling,” said Leigh Brady, senior vice president-education services. “Now if we can just bring along some nice loans.”

Blaine's light-hearted comments about the medical procedure did not appear Friday in a longer article in the Wall Street Journal on Bank Transfer Day. There was quoted as saying he was not necessarily a big fan of Bank Transfer Day because of the “tactical error” problems that can be encountered in switching accounts.

Blaine suggested consumers “pick another day,” the article said.