Is a bank a shop? Are the banks all bastards?
We had a customer with a contract to build roads in the north east of South Australia. Normally it's so dry that the area is barely habitable but it was just this poor bloke's luck that as soon as he began work the weather turned wet. His overdraft got bigger and bigger as he paid workers to sit doing nothing and paid off machinery to do the same. His limit was AU$500,000 which would be something like $18,000,000 today. And he was way over that. Something like $850,000 in debt.

Manager Ian McI thought the contractor was good for it but was eventually over ruled by head office. So he spent the best part of one afternoon signing documents requiring the contractor to show cause why the bank should not foreclose. These had to be sent by certified mail.

The next morning he told the office junior not to go to the post office for the mail since he had to send the documents out himself. Half an hour later he was back with the mail. He handed it to the junior to open and went to his office.

A few minutes passed and there was a sort of strangled cry from the junior. He jumped up and rushed into the manager's office with a cheque in his hand.

It was drawn on the Reserve Bank of Australia by the South Australian government, payable to our contractor for a mere $730,000. It's still the biggest cheque I've ever held.

So the manager had to go back to the post office and sweet talk the postmaster into giving him back the documents. Which was illegal, but nobody complained.
(Redemption blamed it on the Bossa Nova since, Wed 16 May 2012, 11:55, Reply)