{"id":9515,"date":"2020-10-19T09:00:55","date_gmt":"2020-10-19T16:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?p=9515"},"modified":"2020-10-18T20:13:30","modified_gmt":"2020-10-19T03:13:30","slug":"i-couldnt-have-said-it-better-myself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?p=9515","title":{"rendered":"I Couldn&#8217;t Have Said It Better Myself"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>by Bob Sparrow<\/p>\n<p><em>(When writing this blog, I&#8217;ve never just copied and pasted an entire article I&#8217;ve seen elsewhere, but that&#8217;s about to end, as this 96-year old woman&#8217;s letter to her bank said it much better than I ever could.\u00a0 I share her dislike of banks.)<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?attachment_id=9519\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-9519\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-9519\" src=\"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Wells-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"233\" \/><\/a>Letter to my bank<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>To whom it may concern,<\/p>\n<p>I am writing to thank you for bouncing my check with which I endeavored to pay my plumber last month. <strong>By my calculations, three nanoseconds must have elapsed between his depositing the check and the arrival in my account of the funds needed to honor it<\/strong>. I refer, of course, to the automatic monthly transfer of funds from my modest savings account, an arrangement which, I admit, has been in place for only thirty-one years.<\/p>\n<p>You are to be commended for <strong>seizing that brief window of opportunity<\/strong>, and also for debiting my account $30 by way of penalty for the inconvenience caused to your bank.<\/p>\n<p>My thankfulness springs from the manner in which this incident has caused me to rethink my errant financial ways. I noticed that whereas I personally attend to your telephone calls and letters, when I try to contact you, I am confronted by the <strong>impersonal, overcharging, pre-recorded, faceless entity<\/strong> which your bank has recently become.<\/p>\n<p>From now on, I, like you, choose only to deal with a flesh-and-blood person.<\/p>\n<p>My mortgage and loan repayments will therefore and hereafter no longer be automatic, but will arrive at your bank, by check, <strong>addressed personally and confidentially to an employee<\/strong> at your bank whom you must nominate.<\/p>\n<p>Be aware that it is an offense under the Postal Act for any other person to open such an envelope.<\/p>\n<p>Please find attached an Application Contact Status form which I require your chosen employee to complete.<\/p>\n<p>I am sorry it runs to <strong>eight pages,<\/strong> but in order that I <strong>know as much about him or her as your bank knows about me<\/strong>, there is no alternative.<\/p>\n<p>Please note that all copies of his or her medical history must be countersigned by a Notary Public, and the mandatory details of <strong>his\/her financial situation (income, debts, assets and liabilities)<\/strong> must be accompanied by documented proof. In due course, I will issue your employee with a PIN number which he\/she must quote in dealings with me. I regret that it cannot be shorter than <strong>28 digits<\/strong> but, again, I have modeled it on the number of button presses required of me to access my account balance on your phone bank service. As they say, <strong>imitation is the sincerest form of flattery<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Please allow me to level the playing field even further. When you call me, you will now have a menu of options on my new voice mail system to choose from.<\/p>\n<p>Please press the buttons as follows:<\/p>\n<p>Press 1: To make an appointment to see me.<\/p>\n<p>Press 2: To query a missing payment.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_9526\" style=\"width: 285px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?attachment_id=9526\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-9526\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-9526\" class=\"wp-image-9526 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/waiting-on-hold.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"275\" height=\"183\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-9526\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">On hold with the bank!<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Press 3: To transfer the call to my living room in case I am there.<\/p>\n<p>Press 4: To transfer the call to my bedroom in case I am sleeping.<\/p>\n<p>Press 5: To transfer the call to my toilet in case I am attending to nature.<\/p>\n<p>Press 6: To transfer the call to my mobile phone if I am not at home.<\/p>\n<p>Press 7: To leave a message on my computer, a password to access my computer is required. <strong>Password will be communicated to you at a later date<\/strong> to the Authorized Contact.<\/p>\n<p>Press 8: To return to the main menu and to listen to options 1 through 7.<\/p>\n<p>To make a general complaint or inquiry. The contact will then be <strong>put on hold<\/strong>, pending the attention of my automated answering service. While this may, on occasion, involve a lengthy wait, uplifting music will play for the duration of the call.<\/p>\n<p>Regrettably, but again following your example, I must also levy an <strong>establishment fee of $50<\/strong> to cover the setting up of this new arrangement. Please credit my account after each occasion.<\/p>\n<p>Your Humble Client&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><em>(That&#8217;s telling &#8217;em granny!\u00a0 I thought of your letter again today as eight of us were waiting in line at the bank (socially distanced out the door) while one teller was working and 5 other bank employees were busy doing nothing behind the &#8216;glass curtain&#8217;, being sure not to make eye-contact with those of us waiting in line!\u00a0 They want to take care of my money, but don&#8217;t seem that interested in taking care of me. Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrg!!!)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Bob Sparrow (When writing this blog, I&#8217;ve never just copied and pasted an entire article I&#8217;ve seen elsewhere, but that&#8217;s about to end, as this 96-year old woman&#8217;s letter to her bank said it much better than I ever &hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?p=9515\">read more<span class=\"meta-nav\"><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9520,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[69,3415,3416,775],"class_list":["post-9515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-banks","tag-lack-of-customer-service","tag-put-on-hold","tag-wells-fargo"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Waiting-on-phone.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p31aN0-2tt","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9515"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9515\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9527,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9515\/revisions\/9527"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}