Stopping a Credit Card in the US
Supposedly this sequence of events will cause a stop on a credit card:

1. Fill up your car at a self-service pump.

2. Fill up your friend's car at a self-service pump.

3. Buy a pair of expensive running shoes.

I haven't tried it.
(uncle_bud is not the jelly roll king., Wed 22 Jul 2009, 2:18, 3 replies)

Lloyds
Back about 12 years, maybe more, I was well overdrawn with Abbey so had the cunning plan of opening a second account with Lloyds and getting my wages paid into there so I actually had money to live on that wasn't being swallowed by an unauthorised overdraft on an overdraft.

After a few weeks I noticed that I was going overdrawn with Lloyds too, unauthorised. Turns out they hadn't put any kind of zero limit on the account so even with no cash in the account I could still withdraw money, albeit incurring charges at the same time.

I walked into the bank to chat to one of their staff and explained that I wanted them to put a limit on the account to stop me overdrawing through the hole in the wall. They told me they only do that to bad customers. No matter how much I begged and pleaded they refused. Even when I told them I was a bad customer and would continue to be until they limited it. They still refused.

So I continued to be a bad customer until they eventually did it. Probably cost me a fortune in charges.
(Jboy, Wed 22 Jul 2009, 1:59, 7 replies)

Credit
In addition to my previous post about student credit cards, my card of 9 years was recently cancelled. I asked them why, and they said it was because I always paid it on time (the only interest I ever paid was the 19p they charged me by mistake - but I couldn't be arsed to argue).

So basically, I was costing them money by always paying on time, so they closed the account with 2 days notice. I couldn't really argue though - I actually felt a bit guilty for inconveniencing them...
(Supermonkey, Wed 22 Jul 2009, 1:18, Reply)

Rough day..
This dog walks into a Bank and says:
"Can I arrange a mortgage, three standing orders with my landlord, loan company and somebody I owe money to"

"In fact, while I'm here - can I set up some direct debits for my Gas bill, Electricity and TV licence"

"I'm OK for my council tax cause' I got lucky with the lottery last year - it was only four numbers, but it saw me through for the year, and it keeps me out of the courts I guess..."

And the girl behind the counter says:
"Fuck me, a talking dog.."

Completely off topic, I know, but at least it involves a bank.
(danniekavanagh did nothing constructive on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 23:43, 1 reply)

This morning
Dracula went into the bank and the cashier said "I need to check your account".
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 22:58, 1 reply)

Recently
a childishly rendered cock and balls went into the bank and said "I'm just checking I'm not overdrawn".
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 22:57, Reply)

The other day
I went into the bank and said "I just need to check my balance".

So the cashier said... "stand on one leg and try and catch this!"
( browser still relating boring anecdotes into a void on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 22:52, Reply)

Late entry for the gyms question?
The changing rooms have two sets of showers. Today, both were out of use. One set because they are being retiled - and have been undergoing retiling for six months (the management apparently labouring under the belief that tiles grow like mildew on walls left unattended).

The other set was closed because someone had taken a shit on the floor in there.




Look - if I say something about deposits, does that make it a bank-related answer?
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 21:52, 6 replies)

Alliance & Leicester
They are fuckers of the highest magnitude and are not to be trusted.

Actually, now I think of it, it's less of a story than a fact.

Cnuts.
(philip normal, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 21:12, 1 reply)

I
bought Europe a couple of weeks ago. The whole of Europe. 28 quadrillion quid, it cost me.

Then I convinced the bank it was a computer error and they cancelled the bill!
( uberdeity Wondered why Owen Lars knew of the term "hell" on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 20:34, 1 reply)

I got a statement through at crimbo
saying I was £18,500 overdrawn!!!

And my mam shouted at me...
(i should have joined myspace, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 20:28, Reply)

Purchases
Several years ago, I used to work for a certain Royal Bank doing security checks on people's cards. Essentially, someone would be putting through a transaction (usually a large one) when a message would appear on the card machine telling the shop assistant to ring us. So they would. We'd ask security questions, the customer would loudly assure us that they were extremely rich and had loads of money in their account (for the benefit of everybody else in the shop, of course); and then we'd give the shop assistant a little code to put into their machine, so that all would be well.

So far so tedious.

Mostly you ended up with a load of irate customers, but the high point of your working week was when you found a card that was genuinely stolen, so that you couls consider yourself a Batman-style crimefighter. With a headset and little nameplate above your computer. So this one time, I had the following conversation (abridged):

Me: Blah blah blah how may I help you?

Shop person: Hi, I'm calling from xxxx shop. Can you do a security check on this card as we're a bit suspicious of the customer?

Me: No bother, can you say why you're suspicious?

Shop person: Well, the name on the card is a Mr. Elvis Tserivanga* and the customer's a white person.

Me: That would do it. *looks up account info* Can you put the guy on?

So, the guy came on the phone, I gave him the spiel about it being a routine security check, then we got down to business.

Me: Can you give me the first two letters of your mother's maiden name?

Him: Err...SB?

Me: That's not it. Would you like to try again?

Him: QZ?

Me: This isn't your card, is it?

Him: No.

Me: You know that I'm going to have to cancel the card, right?

Him: I guess.

Me: Can you put the shop assistant back on, please?

Him: Okay, sure...bye...

Shop person: He's just left the shop.


So, a very polite but dim criminal. How did he think he was going to get away with it?

*Not the real name, but that was the gist of it.
(Bernard Bernoulli, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 20:12, Reply)

Boring rant
I've had an Abbey credit card since I was 19. I signed up for it at a student fair, and I was accepted even though I didn't have a bank account. I used it cautiously, paying every bill in full immediately.

When I tried to open a bank account with Abbey several years later, they said I couldn't open one without a regular wage, because I was a risk. I informed them that they had given me a credit card already (which you would think would be a higher risk), and they told me that was impossible without a bank account. Yeah, I imagined the credit card in my wallet... In the meantime they kept sending me spam offering me credit cards when they had already given me one.

A year later I went back and they gave me a bank account, with one of those shitty electron cards.

Bastards.

Also, my friend (who used to work for a mortgage company) told me that you have more chance of getting a mortgage if you already have debts, because "they don't trust people who don't owe any money". Banks suck donkey balls.
(Supermonkey, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 19:34, 4 replies)

World's politest Bank Robber
When I started out in Banking, as a whippersnapper of 18, I worked for the Head Office of the TSB, at their branch on Lombard Street in the City. It was 1989, and there was a bit of a building boom going on round there, and we used to get a load of builders coming in to the bank to use the facilities.

I was being trained as a cashier when my colleague noticed a really scruffy bloke in the queue. Scruffy even by builder standards. He queued for a good five minutes, until he got to the counter and pulled out a handgun and requested that we allow him to make a withdrawal from the Branch account...

But why bother queuing when you've got a gun?

Sadly for him, City of London plod were all over him like a cheap suit the minute he left the branch with his swag.

The gun was real.
( Sallyrsm, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 19:20, 2 replies)

Lets start with a simple one...
Back in the dim and distant past, when the (very) young Duke was working in the service sector and being paid actual money in his actual hand. I had an account with the TSB for the simple reason that it was closest to my school. The meagre wages I paid in every week were slowly building up to a respectable sum, which I was saving to spend on a hard drive for my Amiga, a huge investment for a geeky 17 yearold.

This was the easy bit. Monday morning, pay money in, get recipt, tuck recipt into savings book, head on to school for another week of tedious Comp. Sci. lessons in which the teacher could almost keep up with us.

Then, the fateful day. I had enough money in my account to send off a cheque for the hard drive and Not quite flatten my account down to zero.
So I did, and a few days after that I was enjoying the phenomenal cosmic power that only 20 megabytes of passably fast disk storage can give.

A few days after that a letter arrived from the bank saying essentially:-
"This account requires a minimum deposit of £5, You have fallen below this minimum for N days. Please deposit funds as soon as possible or we'll close your account. PS this letter has cost you £25"

Followed the next day by a letter saying:-
"Your account is £20.87 overdrawn, you have no overdraft facility in place so we are charging you £50. PS this letter has cost you £25"

Followed at second post with a handfull of letters saying:-
"There is no credit facility on this account. We have been forced to refuse a payment from your account so we are charging you £25 for refusing payment. PS this letter has cost you £25"

etc...

Over £500 in self generating bank charges before some machine somewhere crashed its cogs, decided that something wasn't right, and froze my account.

Cue a slightly pale faced young Duke heading to the bank with a school bag full of increasingly threatening letters and a fiver borrowed from his mum.

Fortunately the bank manager showwed a little common sense and the charges were cancelled as soon as I paid the cash in.

No mess, no major hassle, aside from one thing.
Mum never let me forget the day that I was in hideous, life crippling, unrepayable debt and
she lent me a miracle fiver to get my life back on track and make me the rich and happy man I am today.

Ahm, yeah, thanks mum...
( DukeEuphoria Comes highly reccomended, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 19:11, 3 replies)

I suppose my most protracted
example of procrastination is answering a QOTW 8 months too late.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 19:02, 4 replies)

Money Laundering Regulations
Most of us, I am sure, have fallen foul of some jobsworth Nazi quoting money laundering regulations at us as their reason not to do what we want them to do, account-wise. Opening an account for a child is harder than giving birth to same.

About 15 years ago, however, things were rather more relaxed, speshly if you worked for a place that offered numbered accounts to slightly iffy people.

All we had to do to comply with regs was to ask politely what they'd be doing with any cash withdrawals over $10,000 (about £5k).
Just had to ask "and what will you be spending the money on, sir?"
One client in particular, who regularly took out about a quarter of a million dollars in cash would smile, and say "shopping".

Of course. Probably shopping for AK47's but hell, at least we'd asked.
( Sallyrsm, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 19:00, 2 replies)

Awkward moment....
When I was working as a cashier I had the good/mis? fortune to serve a young lady called Linzi Drew. At the time she was, I believe, editor of a Gentleman's publication called Penthouse.

I know that because prior to setting up home with me, my fiance had what can best be described as a heroic amount of pron (I quite liked the letters...)

Anyway, it's rather odd counting out a bundle of ayrton's to a woman whose ladypieces you have seen in what I can only describe as "a full gape"

She was a little bit dogruff when only behind an inch of bullet-proof. Very polite though.
( Sallyrsm, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 18:55, 1 reply)

Banks? Who needs them.
I'm reading over these posts and I wonder why so many of you haven't seen the light (in a purely metaphorical sense, not adjudicating a evangelical institution) over banks. A bank is a corporation that's #1 goal is to make money. Plain and simple, like any other business. The only thing different is regulation and how they do it. That's why they have low interest rates on savings and high fines, levies and interest rates on loans.



There's a little financial institution I'd like to interest everyone to. It's called a "credit union". I know these are readily available in the US, and I believe they are in the UK though there's only a few of them.

Functionally, they're similar to a bank in that they hold money for you, give you interest, loans, etc. They're also corporations and are designed to make money. The key difference is that they are run by the members, rather than a business owner.

They also have tight regulations (again, this is the US I'm talking about, don't know about the regs for UK credit unions) that keep them from making too high of a profit margin. That means that income they get goes back to the members in the form of better services and interest rates. While interest rates are in the shithole now, a credit union will still offer substantially better interest rates on anything it offers than a regular bank. A guy I know at USbank (yes, that's their name) is only getting 0.1% interest on his savings, my credit union is getting 0.25%

What else? Well, any loans or loan-related services they offer (such as credit card issuance) will have better terms. That means you pay less interest on a loan, or get a credit card with low/no terms. My Visa that I have through my credit union has no interest and I only pay a small yearly fee for it. If you went through a bank they'll hit you with interest and steep fees.

So what's the catch? Well, to join a credit union you have to meet their membership qualifications, which usually entail living in a specific area (San Diego County Credit Union -- mine), being part of a specific organization (Navy Federal Credit Union -- any branch of the armed forces) or other requirements. Typically even if you move or leave the organization, as long as you continue to follow the charter rules, you can stay in the credit union indefinitely.


Seriously, banks are evil. Fuck 'em. Every one of them deserves to die and collapse under their own broken and immoral ways.


She didn't complain about length!
(Magus Zeal reloading since, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 18:48, 4 replies)

How to get served more quickly in a bank
1. Wait patiently - to be more specific, all you need to do is to wait *more* patiently than the people in front of you. Eventually, as seeing an actual person in a bank takes ages, the person ahead in the queue will get bored, start tutting and huffing, and will leave. You are now one place further up! Rinse and repeat. You could also regale the people waiting behind you with tales of how long you've already waited. This won't move you along in the queue, but might just provide some entertainment.

2. To get your cheque processed quickly, use one of those automated machines, but put too much paper in along with your cheque and paying-in slip. The machine will have the digital equivalent of a choking fit and will spit it all back out at you, but, a member of staff will *also* creep out of wherever they were hiding to sort it all out manually. Your cheque is now stamped and processed whilst everyone else with a cheque is waiting to see a teller. Clever.
( Peapod Has returned to the fold on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 18:18, 1 reply)

Really Boring Post Warning
I suppose i'm somewhat breakijng from tradition in making a post that is in no way amusing, in intent or effect.

Having read all these posts about various big name banks being total fucking unhelpful bastards, i really have to say it:
Join the Co-op!

OK so there are very few branches, but when the online banking/telephone banking works like a charm, with helpful staff in English call centres, why do you ever really need to go in in person?

And they have an ethical policy too.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Tue 21 Jul 2009, 17:35, 4 replies)

Halifax
I'll be very brief...
A couple of months ago I went to my branch of Halifax.
"I know I'm close to my limit, but I have just been told that my mum is entering the final stages of a long illness and is not expected to see out the month. Should this happen I will have to travel back to Scotland to make arrangements. Can you increase my o/d by a couple of hundred?"
"No"

Thankfully she lasted beyond the end of the month so i didn't need them.
Cunts.
(bof, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 17:07, 1 reply)

I'm a chef
I regularly do the banking for the restaurant I work at on my way home if I'm on an early shift.

Sometimes, as a perk of the job you could say, I borrow some ingredients to use at home.

Can't wait for the time I get stopped and searched by the filth in central London - they'll find loads of cash and some suspicious bags containing white powder in my backpack.

Don't think they'll believe its castor sugar, somehow.
(Pastabator earned his brown wings with your girlfriend on, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:51, 2 replies)

Alliance and Leicester.
I closed my ISA with them, only to be told they can't find my cash. WTF? They're a sodding bank, how can they just lose money? I got it back about 6 weeks later, with an apology and £50, after about 30 phone calls. Twats
(Bear Pookie The Frankly Challenged. Halloween is coming to town., Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:29, 1 reply)

Bank related woe
Whilst it seems I have been luckier than some of those posting here, I still have an array of banking cockuppery to relate.

- Barclays, who persist in putting a block on my boyfriends' card every time he goes abroad. Even when he's phoned them in advance to let them know he's going out of the country.

- Lloyds (ahh, Lloyds, where do I begin?), who tried to do me a favour. I went to draw some cash out one lunchtime, and was mildly ticked off to find that the machine closest was having none of it. No bother, I figure, and wander a few roads up to the next one. Still no joy. By now, panic is setting in. I know there's money in there... At least, I thought there was. Why isn't my card working? As happens in these cases, your mind starts fearing the worst, and I trundle over to the nearest Lloyds branch to find out what's going on.

By the time I get there, I'm firmly convinced that the police are waiting to pounce as soon as I show my sorry face and that the end of the world is, in fact, coming. Shaking like a leaf, I ask the lady at the counter to find out why my card isn't working.

Turns out they'd decided to upgrade my common or garden cashpoint card (which I liked because it stops you spending anything) to a proper Visa debit one. They'd cancelled my current card, but forgotten to send me the new one. Oh... Or tell me that they were doing it.

- Lloyds again. One of my bank cards was cancelled for fraudulent use, even before I'd actually received it in the post. That has to be something of a record...

- Lloyds have also screwed up my overdraft limit whilst a student. I had an overdraft set up, and when it was due for renewal, they sent me a letter asking to confirm I wanted to keep it. Being a cunning little thing, I both wrote and phoned them, to say that yes please, I'd like to have the overdraft kept as it is.

It's only a week or so into the term when the student loan has yet to arrive, that I get another letter from the bank, saying that I'm about £500 overdrawn, with no overdraft limit. As such, they're charging me a silly amount of money for each day I am over, plus a silly amunt more for every transaction I have made (which they happily let me do), plus an even sillier amount for the sending of this automated letter.

Thankfully the student loan arrived the next day, which got me into the black again, and I was able to get all my charges refunded, thanks to some digging around for letters and record phone conversations.

- Lloyds yet again. I was unlucky enough to get mugged back in February. Some council estate scrotes thought it's be a merry jape to try and steal my handbag. I managed to keep hold of it in the end, but not before one of the more enterpising thugs had made off with my wallet.

This happened about 2 minutes from my door, so I immediately run back hope and phone up the bank to cancel my card. In absolute floods, I manage to have a vaguely coherant conversation with a Lloyds guy and get my card cancelled. As he confirms that he's blocked it, he then decides that now would be an ideal time to ask me if I would like to take out their ID protection plan for only £10 a month? And while I'm at it, would I be interested in...

It was at this point when I started bawling abuse down the phone at him before hanging up in a mixture of distress and apoplexy.

- Last one. Promise. The "local" branch of Lloyds is actually a bit of a trek away, so I tried to do something with my account using this new fangled internet banking. Turns out that takes over a week to set up, so I try phone banking instead. They ask me for my details, which I give. A few security questions, mothers maiden name etc. I give that too. Then they ask me for two letters from my password. Christ, I have a password?! Eventually I think I remember it, so give them that too. Then, to add insult to injury, they ask for a pass number. By now, I have no idea if I'm coming or going, so give up and head to the local branch. Who can't do what I want.

- I lied. Does anyone else find it ridiculous the amount of post they get from their bank? I swear, every other flipping envelope is from them, and they all go straight in the bin...
(Kitimariana, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:28, Reply)

Alliance & Leicester
Have just been rather special. I needed to transfer 4 grand to a supplier. Needs to be FasterPayments as the money needs to be there tomorrow. Fine. So, I ring Alliance & Leicester to be told that the limit per customer per day for FP is £250. What madness is this?

Their suggestion is that I go and withdraw 4 grand from the Post Office, go to the supplier's bank, deposit there and all will be good. This, I do - except I realise that there's not a branch of their bank in the town I'm in.

So, with 4 grand in cash on me, I head back to my local A&L branch, where I mention the problems. "Um, you can deposit it here and it'll go straight into their account", mentions the woman.

Nnnng.
( shadyron, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:17, 2 replies)

revenge is a dish best served with a fiscal kick to the knackers
A long long time ago in a galaxy far far away there was a young paduan who had become a slave to an evil financial behemoth. It had begun innocently enough, the chap needed a relationship with these 'lenders' in order for his credits from his toil in the salt mine to be transferred on a monthly basis. So careful was he with his coin that the lenders felt it appropriate to suggest he also take a credit card from the same company.

While time spent in the salt mines on naboo was shitty enough the paduan passed life pleasantly by smokin spice millange, drinking spacebooze and chasing a bit of spacefluff, from time to time. One fateful day however the mine was shut down with zero notice to the slaves and spacecunts within, and so after a brief period of debauchery and celebration the entire motley crew were released to seek their fortune elswhere.

Having recently become somewhat attached to fit little piece from the blasting section our man decided to fill up his pack salt and follow her to omicron persee i 9 where allegedly a plucky young buck could earn a buck... however on arriving to a land filled with sun , topless beaches , cheap booze and late bars the conditions for labour were not in his favour... so he blew his overdraft and maxed out his credit card and had a bloody good time doing it too..

So it was 10 months later that he returned to naboo to find a rather large pile of letters from the lenders demaning full repayment of both debts, and not in a 'please sir' sort of way... more of a 'fucking now cunt' sentiment was being expressed. Well our boy was only on spacedole at the time so suggested that seeing as the card and the overdraft were with the same company could we amalgamate the two loans and make a small monthly repayment until better times returned. The lenders balked and bellowed at this suggestion and continued with threats of legal action and testicle crushage for quite some time.

Twas only a matter of time however before the chap secured a job and the bobs began once again to roll in.. at which point the lenders in question began to take a civil approach and 'why yes' we can amalgamate those loans now that you have a job... we were only fucking you because you were already fucked and well dog eat dog innit' suggestith they.

Roll on a year or so and our slightly older paduan is withdrawing cash for his christmas shopping and did withdraw a 1000 zonks for pressies and merriment and went on his way. Twas only about a week later that he noticed his account seemed to be far beefier than it should have been for a new year and he checked the reciepts in his wallet. Sure enough there was the one from the bank only instead of 1000 euro withdrawal reciept, I had one for a lodgment. So that was me 2000 up on the deal. I sought some advice and was told that they would be in touch but there was little they could do and lo and behold they got the fella who gave me the money to call up to try and jog my memory as to whether it was a lodgement or a withdrawal I had made that day...

Hmmm let me see, thinketh I out loud and for quite a paused period of time... yes I remember now, twas most certainly a lodgment I made that day... "Oh that's fine Sir, just checking, have a happy new year" .... "and many happy returns yourself" I added.




moved banks just after that and have been with them for years... they are really good and understand the value of dosh... example, on one occasion, overdraft used up I needed a few pound to collect my car from the garage.... "well we don't normally, but look we won't see you stuck, there you go chief".... if they ever made a boob in my favour I would hand it over straight away... fair is fair..
(The Cats Twat, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:16, Reply)

Chunder deposit
When I was a student, a mate came over to stay with me. I cooked one of the meals in my 2 meal repertoire; Chilli con carnie, then we went out on the piss. Being young and stupid we drank ridiculous amounts (snakebite and black if memory serves) then back to mine for a few 'hits from the bong' and whatever additional booze could be found.

The next morning my mate decided that the cold chilli looked just the ticket to expunge the hangover so polished off what was left in the pot. For the liquid part of his breakfast he chose milk. He then popped over the road to the bank to make a cash withdraw to give me some money for some herbaceous samples provided the night before. The cash point was out of order but the bank was open so he went in

I don't think I could eat cold congealing chilli followed by a pint of milk now, let alone after a night on snakebite. It was in the queue he began to feel ill. He got to the cashier and as he opened his mouth to speak he did a minisick. He attempted to swallow the minisick but that just triggered a full on chunder and barffed copiously into the tray thingy, then ran out the bank barffing a few more pavement pizzas along the way back to mine.

I nearly barffed laughing and several hours later went back to the bank (now smelling straonly of disinfecant) and asked for a copy of the security tape only to be met with a stonily cold expression, the cunts
(sittingduck Attention seeking, bullshitting fuck-knuckle, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:10, 1 reply)

Alliance & Leicester
My girlfriend and I acquired our first flat last year and thought that it might simplify things to have a joint account for expenses related to said abode. Alliance and Leicester offered the best deal at the time, so we duly opened an account in readiness for our moving monies. As we had just moved, this was opened with reference to our old address and correspondence undertaken with a short delay via the (surprisingly reliable) Royal Mail forwarding service. All cards, PINs and cheque books arrived in short and correct order. So far, so good.

Then came the change of address.

A simple procedure, the change of address can be easily done by wandering into a branch, showing some official document with a name and the new address on it and letting the bank's machinations occur, in much the same way as one might change other minor account details. It was wonderfully successful and our new bank cards arrived a few weeks later.

New bank cards? That's a new one for a simple change of address, given that piece of information doesn't usually make it onto the card. A brief examination of mine proved it to be in fine order, bearing my name in embossed plastic. My other half's, however, was not quite so accurate. Evidently, A&L's upper echelons object to those living in sin and had changed my beloved's surname to match mine. Who would open a joint account with a non-family member, after all?

This should be easy to rectify, we thought, popping into the branch with some ID and proof of address. You can probably see what's coming here. Given the nature of a joint account, I was only able to make changes to my own details, leaving my other half to deal with this spot of administrative confusion herself; this would have been fine were it not that her ID didn't match the name on the account, the account being, as it was, in the name of my apparent spouse. Some cold staring occurred, and not a little incredulity. Never mind; after that initial meeting, A&L graciously agreed to change the name back, giving the impression that they were doing us a huge favour by doing so. We left to await bank cards with the correct details.

Lo and behold, they arrived within five working days and at the correct address! Or one did, anyway; mine, with a new PIN. My beloved, now frosty in her thoughts toward the bank, made a brief several hour telephone call to the number supplied in case of error, only to find that she was unable to make any changes to the account because she wasn't named on it. I was absent for a hefty part of this, but I imagine terse and displeased language was employed (neither of us are fond of raised voices).

Another full set of cards were forthcoming through the postal service, this time one each: both bore my surname. At this point, it became apparent that it may have been quicker to get married and rectify the problem that way. A trip to the branch seemed in order, so off we jolly well went on a sunny Saturday morn. The barely literate chimps behind the desk stared in blank confusion whilst filing their talons and not listening to a simple and accurate list of events to this point, relayed in words as short as possible. Once they had grasped the tale to this point, they sought to make amends immediately and asked for some ID with the correct name and address so that they might update their records. Upon receipt of this, they wandered away aimlessly to make copies and returned our papers to us. Well, I say they returned them. They meandered back to their previously vacant slots and placed our documents atop the counter, then resumed their vacantly staring at a monitor behind the desk, ignoring us until we enquired as to the next step in this operation. Returning from their reverie, the apparent banker seemed to notice us for the first time that day and said that nothing could go through the system until Monday morning. Quietly seething, we left to do something more productive, like turning each individual brick in the local shopping centre upside-down, or trying to cure AIDS with by blowing in people's ears.

When the new cards arrived (yes, a new one for me as well), guess what name was on them. Go on, guess.

When this was finally resolved (after four months), I nearly proposed solely to see if the resulting name change on the joint account would cause the bank staff's heads to implode and crash their computer system, but I fancied rather that they would simply forget they had ever seen us before, as they seem to do every time either of us try to contact them (which is blessedly little now that cash flow is smoother).

They've also installed a completely pointless glowing wall that changes colour every few seconds and makes me nauseous when I go in even perfectly sober (something I try to avoid). I'll wager it's some form of hypnotic device designed to lull people into docility so they don't notice the god-awful service. It might go some way to explain why the place seems to be staffed by zombies without the appetite for brains.

That was intended to be more amusing. Sorry. EDIT: And shorter.
(ThomsonsPier consumes, Tue 21 Jul 2009, 16:03, 1 reply)

Xmas Eve.
I always start my Christmas piss up going on a bank pub crawl. Most offer their customers a glass of bubbly and a mince pie, so it's basically a free piss up.
(Bear Pookie The Frankly Challenged. Halloween is coming to town., Tue 21 Jul 2009, 15:58, 1 reply)