Helpful Banking

Do you remember the good old days when banks never bothered contacting you unless they wanted to have stern words about the size of your overdraft and how they could no longer find Mexico’s file¹ because yours was so big?

I miss those days.

Now, banks – when they are not busily undermining the global economy with sub prime investments and such – like to be ‘touchy-feely’ with their customers and phone them up to ask if we are happy with their services, if there is anything else they can do to make life easier or some such. Usually they phone just as the plot of the movie you are watching is revealed, or while you are in a meeting with someone very senior and you have unwisely forgotten to mute your phone. At any rate, the calls are always hugely inconvenient and generally unwelcome.

Thus it is that I get back to my desk to find that my two-shot latté is in fact a two-shot cappuccino and instead of a mug of coffee, I have a couple of mouthfuls at the bottom and enough froth to shave in. This is what happens when banks try to be helpful when you are in a long and busy queue trying to buy a drink from someone whose command of English is comparable to my command of Korean.

Mister Mainwaring would not have been amused.




¹Nothing specific against Mexico here, it’s purely alphabetical; L coming before M and all that. Your financial crises probably hide the debts of a completely different country.

Helpful Banking

Do you remember the good old days when banks never bothered contacting you unless they wanted to have stern words about the size of your overdraft and how they could no longer find Mexico’s file¹ because yours was so big?

I miss those days.

Now, banks – when they are not busily undermining the global economy with sub prime investments and such – like to be ‘touchy-feely’ with their customers and phone them up to ask if we are happy with their services, if there is anything else they can do to make life easier or some such. Usually they phone just as the plot of the movie you are watching is revealed, or while you are in a meeting with someone very senior and you have unwisely forgotten to mute your phone. At any rate, the calls are always hugely inconvenient and generally unwelcome.

Thus it is that I get back to my desk to find that my two-shot latté is in fact a two-shot cappuccino and instead of a mug of coffee, I have a couple of mouthfuls at the bottom and enough froth to shave in. This is what happens when banks try to be helpful when you are in a long and busy queue trying to buy a drink from someone whose command of English is comparable to my command of Korean.

Mister Mainwaring would not have been amused.




¹Nothing specific against Mexico here, it’s purely alphabetical; L coming before M and all that. Your financial crises probably hide the debts of a completely different country.

Wistful

My life at work was much simpler in the quondam days when we could look at correspondence from the public and quietly say things like “this issue has been examined and resolved by someone more informed, eloquent and sane than you. Don’t worry about it any more and stick instead to your glitter, safety scissors and wax crayons”.

Actually I don’t think those days ever existed, though I do recall, many years ago, seeing a letter from a member of the public explaining that London’s congestion problem could be alleviated by massive investment in huge fly-over motorways suspended from reinforced helium dirigibles. I did like that and it was written in green pencil.

I think the draft answer thanked the correspondent for his innovative and imaginative input but cited budgetary constraints.

We don’t get that class of idiot writing in anymore, sadly.

Wistful

My life at work was much simpler in the quondam days when we could look at correspondence from the public and quietly say things like “this issue has been examined and resolved by someone more informed, eloquent and sane than you. Don’t worry about it any more and stick instead to your glitter, safety scissors and wax crayons”.

Actually I don’t think those days ever existed, though I do recall, many years ago, seeing a letter from a member of the public explaining that London’s congestion problem could be alleviated by massive investment in huge fly-over motorways suspended from reinforced helium dirigibles. I did like that and it was written in green pencil.

I think the draft answer thanked the correspondent for his innovative and imaginative input but cited budgetary constraints.

We don’t get that class of idiot writing in anymore, sadly.

Quiz Night

I have cider, ellefurtle has lager. We wait to see if keresaspa, Our Man from Belfast arrives.

Either way, quiz and food await. Hurrah!

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Quiz Night

I have cider, ellefurtle has lager. We wait to see if keresaspa, Our Man from Belfast arrives.

Either way, quiz and food await. Hurrah!

Posted via LiveJournal.app.