Unhelpful

I mailed off a letter today to my primary financial institution. You might enjoy it.

To Whom It May Concern:

I’d like to detail for you a frustrating situation I am having as a customer. It has caused me embarrassment, financial distress, and hunger, in that order. I’m going to give you the oh-so-verbose detail-loaded version, so be forewarned.

On Wednesday, 05 May 2004, I offered to take my very good friend out for breakfast after assisting me in moving a car that I was going to have work done on later that evening, at no minor inconvenience to her. The car work had already been put off because of my financial situation. After finishing eating, the bill came to a modest $12.12. When I attempted to pay with my debit card MasterCard, the charge was refused. Thoroughly embarrassed, I left the cashier my driver’s license while I went to a nearby ATM. I knew that the account balance was not a problem, as my payroll Direct Deposit is made every Wednesday morning, but more to the point, I certainly had enough funds in my account, even if my storage company had accidentally taken their automatic fee a day early. The ATM provided no useful information. We headed back to the restaurant, my friend paid, and I retrieved my license. So I had, in ten short minutes, gone from offering to take my friend out for a meal to asking her to pay for it, too, until I can figure out what’s going on. Given that she’d just left work to go to school, the situation was even more horrifying to me.

After contacting Member Services, I was told that the reason the card was cancelled is that it was set to expire this month (05/04), and that a new card was sent, but was returned. I was aware of the card’s imminent expiration, and planned on contacting you by the 15th if I hadn’t received a replacement by then. I verified my address you had on hand, which was correct, so it seems likely to have been a postal carrier error. I was told a new card would be sent immediately, and I asked the customer service representative to re-enable the card I have on hand. This was done.

After waking up later that evening, I went to visit my sister and her husband, and a friend who was going to help me by replacing my alternator. At the cash register of the auto supply store, I had my old alternator in-hand for the core deposit to make this trip $20 cheaper, as well as the new alternator I was buying. The total came to $133.68. Charge denied. As I said, I had been paid that morning, and I positively had enough in the account, so I knew with utter certainty that this was going to end up being a repeat of the previous problem. Meanwhile, as I said, the old alternator was in-hand. This means my car was not going anywhere until something happened, and as it was almost 8:30pm, I had about an hour before I needed to leave for work that night. My brother-in-law ended up loaning me the money by putting the charge on his Visa. As if I don’t already owe him for countless other favors, I had to owe him actual money, too? Seriously, by now this was a tragic comedy of epic proportions. Given the time, I had no choice but to wait until morning to resolve the situation. I had exactly $5.50 in my pocket, I was completely freaked out about money, life, and other things, and my stomach was in a knot. All of this conspired to allow me to rationalize what might not have been a very wise financial decision, considering the situation: I needed ice cream, and I needed it bad. And not just “ice cream”, but Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, because frankly, it was a “1200 calorie $4 pint of ice cream” kind of day, believe me.

Thursday morning came along, and since I had been hard at work all night, instead of staying up to 8:00am to take care of this growing drama, what I ended up doing instead is—being so exhausted, both physically and now mentally—falling asleep dead in my tracks, without even getting my shoes off first. I woke up at about 4:00pm and called up Member Services, again. What I was told happened is that the old card was re-enabled, then the new card was re-ordered, which effectively re-cancelled the old card. The card I had in my hand. The one which I use for everything. The one I use in lieu of checks. Go ahead, look up the dates my last three checks, I’ll wait… It goes back years. Pretty impressive, no? So that was re-enabled, again, I was assured, again. I quickly washed up, and went to an ATM without further adieu. Transaction denied. As one might imagine, I was laughing and screaming at the same time. It was funny, only not. I walked half a block to a pay phone to find it’s out of order, and continued the rest of the block to a pay phone that was actually working. That was about 4:30pm, and I called Member Services. That was for the third time, just in case I haven’t been clear enough. But wait, there’s more!

I was told that the card was, in fact, active. I assured the Customer Service Representative that, as of five minutes previous, it was not. Then I was told the change must not have propagated within the ATM division. I took her word on that, even though it seems a little odd to have had to re-enable a card twice, let alone three times. Or six. Or however many. She said that, given the time, everyone in that department had probably gone home, but she’d check to see if she could find someone working overtime, or a supervisor. I was on hold for a minute or two, and was then told that they’d all left for the day. I’ll try to recount this part of the conversation as accurately as possible for maximal enjoyment. If I got the exact wording wrong, I apologize:

“Nobody’s there, everyone went home, including the supervisors. You’ll have to call back tomorrow.”

“Huh. They went home. Where they live. Right?”

“Uh, yes, sir.”

“Presumably, they’ll be eating dinner pretty soon, right?”

“I don’t know, sir, I assume so.”

“Well, I won’t. I won’t be eating today. Good bye.”

Out by 4:30 on a Thursday? That sounds like a sweet deal, can I give you my résumé? You can check my Direct Deposit statements for my salary requirements. They’re a lot lower than when I last worked in Maryland, and I sure would like an excuse to come back. I’m flexible, and that’s not just the hunger talking. I enjoy facilitating communication, and I’m very customer-focused. Let me know. Fortunately, I found someone at work willing to pay me a $2 speaker’s appearance fee to hear my story, with which the $1.50 in my pocket after my moment of frozen dairy weakness the previous evening was at least enough for me to fund myself a pair of charity fundraiser hot-dogs. It’s not exactly my first choice in haute cuisine, but it’s charity and it’s for the kids. More to the point, I could afford exactly that and not much else. One positive result is that I’ve kicked caffeine because of all of this. It’s a good thing I don’t have expensive drug habits, or I might be seriously irritated by now. Is “cookie dough” a drug? I’m working under the assumption that it’s not.

As I wrap this up, it’s almost 10:00am on Friday, 07 May 2004. I’ve just talked to Barbara (ext. 7433) whom has, as everyone I’ve talked to, been extremely courteous and helpful, but even more so. I may be biased because she actually pinpointed the problem and fixed it, so now I’m back on the caffeine wagon, and back to purchasing food with my own money. It seems that during the second round of re-enabling, the new card (the re-ordered card) was re-enabled instead of the old card. All of this makes sense, and theoretically, I know how these things can happen.

My specific problem, is that it happened to me. As I stated in the outset, this has caused me embarrassment, financial distress, and hunger, in that order. There are reasons I decided to continue using [unnamed financial institution] after I left Maryland: excellent support (Barb: I’m a huge fan now), better account security than I’ve experienced elsewhere, internet access to the sort of account data I desire, and better operating hours than national and local banks I have access to. This problem is the first I’ve had with my relationship with [unnamed financial institution], and it’s caused me a lot of angst.

I’m prepared to continue being a customer, but I’d also not mind too terribly an act of contrition on your part. I would consider a refund of my ATM costs related to my checking account for the year (your fees and the terminal fees) starting 1 Jan 2004 to 07 May 2004 to be appropriate. The total cost to me of such transactions from that date to today has been $73.25. Such a refund should be deposited to my primary savings account.

Thank you very much for your consideration of this matter, and regardless of what you decide, please mail me some deposit slips if you prefer to have them for mailed-in deposits.

Sincerely,