Way back in January of 2009 I explained how I used my PNC bank / VISA rewards points to get a WII. For every $1.00 in purchases I made using my check card in a credit transaction, I earned two reward points. For every check I wrote, I got 25 points. It was a wonderful thing.
Then, in July, it all changed. I reached a NEW EARNING LEVEL. I leveled up as it were. But instead of getting more, I got less. Where I used to earn two points for every one dollar of purchases, I now had a straight one to one relationship. Still, for gas, food, or drug purchase I made, I got double points. It was still a pretty decent thing.
I recently just checked my account and now I earn one point for every $2.00 I spend.
If I were to use my VISA credit card… which has no balance, I’d earn one point for every dollar. If were to use it as a debit purchase, I’d get a point for every $5.00.
I just don’t understand it. I was getting a lot of rewards for using my bank. I was being REWARDED for being a customer. So, what happened? Oh yeah, that’s right. Credit card companies became the bad guy and the Credit Card Holders Bill of Rights was enacted. That meant the nefarious practices that were going on for years to bilk more money out of customers with ridiculous fees and interest rates had to stop. So, since companies couldn’t offset the giving away of money to its customers by stealing it somewhere else, they had to reduce their costs the only way they were allowed. They stopped showing the love in rewards points.
I shouldn’t bitch though, right? After all, I was never obligated to make any purchases in order to gain rewards. VISA was nice enough to give me free money. The fact that they can’t afford to keep giving me free money should be a reason to stop doing it. I mean they only pulled in close to $1 billion dollars of profit last year. There are mouths to feed. I get it. It’s OK, VISA. You go take care of your own shareholders. Us customers will be just fine.
If that seemed a little sarcastic, then I apologize. Oh, wait, I’m not actually obligating anyone to listen to me, so I don’t need to offer an apology. Readers are here of their own free will.
See how that works? When people bitch about something offending them, others say, “Hey, you shouldn’t bitch. They don’t have to offer that.” To which I say, “I never asked them to offer it. They just did it. Now they can’t continue to do it and I’m supposed to be completely OK about it?” I am a consumer. I was being given a service in return for my continued consumption and now that service is gone. Will I quit using the bank that offers that service? Maybe. My bank deals with VISA not MasterCard or any other company, so if I choose to vote with my wallet, that’s what I should do.
A blogger may sound like a whiny gnat that keeps getting in your screen door during the summer nights. We may be annoying while being an insignificant creature but we’re drawn to the lights. Turn out the lights and we’ll go away.
Until then, we bug, we blog, we buzz around your salad, looking for a place to call home. I’m just here to tell everyone else that someone out there changed the game.
Got Mongo? Feed On This!"
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Showing posts with label Banks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Banks. Show all posts
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Saturday, August 27, 2011
I Want My Two Dollars
Excuse me for a second. I'm waiting to speak with a Customer Service agent about a charge on my bank statement....
Oh, hang on, he's here.
First of all, I know that we shouldn't kill so many trees. I get that. However, bank statements are one of those things you need to keep around in case the IRS comes a knockin'. Instead of being a bright shining beacon of security and service, the bank has decided to pass that cost onto the customer. They don't want to waste the ink, paper, postage, and man hours to send out a statement. They want you waste the paper and ink to print out yourself.
I know I could just pdf all of my statements and keep them on a media storage device. Unfortunately, in the last two years I've had a 500 gb external hard drive, and a 8gb flash drive brick up and become unusable. I've lost a good bit of information. The idea is not to keep placing copies of stuff around the digital aether of storage devices in my house. I should be able to get my statement, and put it in a filing cabinet along with all my other important documents... or a safe, if I so choose.
Perhaps it's time to move on from S&T. My wife and I only use them for a checking account and two savings accounts. The checking account isn't even our a primary one. It's my wife's, which has a small balance just for little stuff. Losing it wouldn't be a problem.
Besides, we haven't been extremely happy with them since they absorbed Irwin Bank & Trust a few years ago. I, myself, have PNC, which absorbed National City, which absorbed Integra, which absorbed Hick Bank of Connellsville after I opened an account back in 1993.
They say don't take your money out of the banks. Don't put it under a mattress. Well, I wouldn't have to go print out a statement of what's under there. I could take out and put in whatever I wanted. I wouldn't need a fancy Internet connection to constantly look at how much I have in there. It's not even like we draw any interest on it, or from any account for that matter. I think my checking account made a whole $2.00 in interest last year. Whoa! That's enough to buy one paper statement from S&T Bank. Maybe I should keep them.
Hmmm, on second thought.
Nah. I'd rather bank with someone who isn't a cheap bastard like me.The other problem I have with this new feature is that if I were 50 or older, it wouldn't matter. So, it's not that they are more concerned with money, it's that they feel older customers may not have access to the Internet. What if I didn't? What if I lived out in the middle of nowhere with no access to the tubes. I guess I pay $2.00 to be a luddite.
Please wait for a site operator to respond.My wife called me at work and wondered why there was this $2.00 "SERVICE CHARGE PAPER STATEMENT" on our bank statement.
Oh, hang on, he's here.
You are now chatting with 'Gene'So, there you have it. After looking around, I did see the paper message that the bank mailed me noting the new charges would start affecting my account. Still, I find this all a little less than great service.
Gene: Hi Mongo-how may I help you?
Mongo: Helo, Gene. I have a question about a line item on my statement
Mongo: Basically, I see a SERVICE CHARGE PAPER STATEMENT listed and I do not know why
Gene: yes-that was sent in June and July statements as a statement enclosure notifying customers that as of 8/1/11 there would be a $2 charge for paper statements going forward from 8/1/11. If you want "no charge" just convert to "online" through our free ExpressNet internet banking product.
Mongo: So, unless I convert to only 'online' statements, I will continue to get a paper statement and be charged $2.00 for having received one. Is that correct?
Gene: correct, unless you are 50 years or older and then you can convert to a 4 star checking account and that type allows FREE paper statements Michael.
Mongo: Not there yet, but thank you. That answers my question.
Gene: you are welcome
First of all, I know that we shouldn't kill so many trees. I get that. However, bank statements are one of those things you need to keep around in case the IRS comes a knockin'. Instead of being a bright shining beacon of security and service, the bank has decided to pass that cost onto the customer. They don't want to waste the ink, paper, postage, and man hours to send out a statement. They want you waste the paper and ink to print out yourself.
I know I could just pdf all of my statements and keep them on a media storage device. Unfortunately, in the last two years I've had a 500 gb external hard drive, and a 8gb flash drive brick up and become unusable. I've lost a good bit of information. The idea is not to keep placing copies of stuff around the digital aether of storage devices in my house. I should be able to get my statement, and put it in a filing cabinet along with all my other important documents... or a safe, if I so choose.
Perhaps it's time to move on from S&T. My wife and I only use them for a checking account and two savings accounts. The checking account isn't even our a primary one. It's my wife's, which has a small balance just for little stuff. Losing it wouldn't be a problem.
Besides, we haven't been extremely happy with them since they absorbed Irwin Bank & Trust a few years ago. I, myself, have PNC, which absorbed National City, which absorbed Integra, which absorbed Hick Bank of Connellsville after I opened an account back in 1993.
They say don't take your money out of the banks. Don't put it under a mattress. Well, I wouldn't have to go print out a statement of what's under there. I could take out and put in whatever I wanted. I wouldn't need a fancy Internet connection to constantly look at how much I have in there. It's not even like we draw any interest on it, or from any account for that matter. I think my checking account made a whole $2.00 in interest last year. Whoa! That's enough to buy one paper statement from S&T Bank. Maybe I should keep them.
Hmmm, on second thought.
Nah. I'd rather bank with someone who isn't a cheap bastard like me.The other problem I have with this new feature is that if I were 50 or older, it wouldn't matter. So, it's not that they are more concerned with money, it's that they feel older customers may not have access to the Internet. What if I didn't? What if I lived out in the middle of nowhere with no access to the tubes. I guess I pay $2.00 to be a luddite.
Friday, April 1, 2011
Doppelbanker
My last name is not exactly a common one like Smith or Jones. However, it seems to be a topic of conversation whenever I meet someone for the first time.
“Oh are you related to so and so?”
“Nope.”
They aren’t even suggesting anyone famous. In fact, there are no famous people with my last name… other than me. :)
Actually, there is a stadium about forty five minutes from Pittsburgh that bears my last name. That’s all I’m giving you.
It’s just that because my last name is so ‘uncommon’, one would think that anyone with that last name had to be related to me. But they aren’t. It has become such a reflexive response that whenever I hear the “Are you related to…” question, I say no before they even say the name.
However, some people won’t take ‘No’ for an answer. They happen to be debt collectors and constables.
About ten years ago, I was unmarried and living in a townhouse. My only roommate was my cat. Yes, my then girlfriend spent a lot of time and ended up moving in after we got engaged but for the most part, she still maintained a residence at her parents’ house and had her maiden name.
Yet, for some reason I began getting phone calls from credit card companies looking to find her, using my last name, because she owed a substantial amount of money and had become delinquent.
I informed the CSR that they had the wrong person and whenever they told me the address, which was in Latrobe, I told them, again, “You have the wrong person.” After about a week, the phone calls stopped.
Then, in 2004, after I had bought my first home and moved in with my fiancée, the phone calls started again, this time, from a state constable. I informed him that my wife will have that name but not until November and she’s never maintained an address in Latrobe. I even went one step further and did an Internet search and found the address and phone number of the right person and gave it to the constable. He thanked me for doing his job and promised not to bother us again with this matter.
Flash forward to yesterday and my wife received a phone call from her work. The receptionist said that she received a call for my wife from a company called First Source. I immediately knew what this was about. Unfortunately, I read a lot of Consumerist and went into assault mode, thinking that this was some weird phantom debt but quickly remembered the whole debacle from ten years ago.
I called up the number and, of course, had a CSR with a heavy foreign accent answer the phone. As soon as he rattled off the Latrobe address I stopped him right there and explained the whole situation. I asked him to remove whatever phone number they called from their database. Hopefully, this fixes the problem. Of course, the damage is done. My wife’s employer gets this wonderful perception that their employee is a dead beat and even her father gets a phone call from the same collection agency.
These people suck at searches as much as they do speaking English.
“Oh are you related to so and so?”
“Nope.”
They aren’t even suggesting anyone famous. In fact, there are no famous people with my last name… other than me. :)
Actually, there is a stadium about forty five minutes from Pittsburgh that bears my last name. That’s all I’m giving you.
It’s just that because my last name is so ‘uncommon’, one would think that anyone with that last name had to be related to me. But they aren’t. It has become such a reflexive response that whenever I hear the “Are you related to…” question, I say no before they even say the name.
However, some people won’t take ‘No’ for an answer. They happen to be debt collectors and constables.
About ten years ago, I was unmarried and living in a townhouse. My only roommate was my cat. Yes, my then girlfriend spent a lot of time and ended up moving in after we got engaged but for the most part, she still maintained a residence at her parents’ house and had her maiden name.
Yet, for some reason I began getting phone calls from credit card companies looking to find her, using my last name, because she owed a substantial amount of money and had become delinquent.
I informed the CSR that they had the wrong person and whenever they told me the address, which was in Latrobe, I told them, again, “You have the wrong person.” After about a week, the phone calls stopped.
Then, in 2004, after I had bought my first home and moved in with my fiancée, the phone calls started again, this time, from a state constable. I informed him that my wife will have that name but not until November and she’s never maintained an address in Latrobe. I even went one step further and did an Internet search and found the address and phone number of the right person and gave it to the constable. He thanked me for doing his job and promised not to bother us again with this matter.
Flash forward to yesterday and my wife received a phone call from her work. The receptionist said that she received a call for my wife from a company called First Source. I immediately knew what this was about. Unfortunately, I read a lot of Consumerist and went into assault mode, thinking that this was some weird phantom debt but quickly remembered the whole debacle from ten years ago.
I called up the number and, of course, had a CSR with a heavy foreign accent answer the phone. As soon as he rattled off the Latrobe address I stopped him right there and explained the whole situation. I asked him to remove whatever phone number they called from their database. Hopefully, this fixes the problem. Of course, the damage is done. My wife’s employer gets this wonderful perception that their employee is a dead beat and even her father gets a phone call from the same collection agency.
These people suck at searches as much as they do speaking English.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
2009 D-Bag Awards - Heat Five: Million Dollar D-Bags
In the game of Monopoly, he who owns everything is the winner. In the D-Bag Awards, those who do so by means which are considered shady and ridiculously low class are the winner. So, for this match up, the following contestants will compete in a “Biggest D-Bag Take All” Game of Monopoly.
First up is The Auto Industry. Representing the Auto Industry is Ford, GM, and Chrysler. You may remember their CEOs made the trek to Washington in 2008, looking for money to bail them out in hopes that they could get more federal funds to stem the bleeding from the recession. They did. So, here’s their turn.
CHANCE: Elected Chairman of the Board. Give yourself a bonus, cut workforce production, go bankrupt and be replaced.
Next up, Wall Street. With the TARP funded bailout last year, one would hope that Wall Street would have learned their lesson and been a better boy this year. Not likely, After lavish retreats and continued bonuses, we realized that the bailout really didn’t trickle down all that much. Yeah, the country didn’t go under and the Earth continues to turn, but even in paying back TARP funds, some banks look to make a profit by cutting the interest and passing along the bill to you.
CHANCE: Your Xmas Fund Matures. Pay back loans early and deny the hand that feeds you with stock prices that cut the amount of money paid back leaving you a profit. Get out from under the thumb of the government so you can go back to paying bonuses for suits and cosmetic changes to your offices. Continue to bend public over a chair as mortgages continue to be foreclosed on in America.
Third in turn is Fox. Fox has gone on such a high this year thanks to the addition of the show glee. However, this is the same company that managed to shift good shows to Friday night’s graveyard while relying on American Idol to win them all the money in the world. That and they copyrighted the word “glee”, but that’s another story.
CHANCE: That’s right. Fox doesn’t take chances. They just cut and run when shows aren't performing that well. The fan club of Dollhouse thanks you.
Next up, NBC. NBC has long been considered one of the best networks. After all, with shows like Law & Order, The Cosby Show, Cheers, ER, Friends, and The Tonight Show in your stable, you must have been doing something right, right? FlashForward to September 2009 and you’ll see why they are in contention.
CHANCE: Advance token to nearest high roller cable company and offer to be bought while simultaneously killing your schedule by doing away with 10pm dramas in hopes that Jay Leno will bring everyone over to watch his new show. Honestly, if Comcast gets controlling stock of NBC, you will see tons of issues. Think about wanting to watch your favorite show and seeing the TV Guide list a four block of time when it might show up.
Raj Rajaratnam, you’re up. Raj has taken time out of his busy schedule today of pleading not guilty to 11 counts of insider trading and we thank him for that.
CHANCE: You’ve been given insider information. Now that’s not even remotely a real card, but then again, we are dealing with a hedge fund. Raj denies benefiting from insider information dealing with a merger between IBM and Sun Microsystems. That non information led to a non million dollar windfall for Raj’s funds. Being a relatively non player in the game of nonsense, Raj is no match for our final contestant.
Bernie Madoff, come on down. As you can see, Bernie is being led to the board in a wonderful orange jumpsuit. That’s because Bernie has already been convicted of running the biggest ponzi scheme this side of organized religion. He managed to ruin more people’s lives than the Internet.
CHANCE: Go Directly Back To Jail, You D-BAG!
The list of Madoff’s d-baggery is so extensive will be in jail for the next two lifetimes and that’s still not enough punishment. There is a special level of Hades for this d-bag and I hope he’s made friends with the sisters on the inside. I’d love to hear that voice over being done by Morgan Freeman.
Today’s match brought to you by Cash4Gold and other fine scam artists.
- Wall Street (The Wheelbarrow)
- Auto Industry (The Racecar)
- Fox (The Dog which we’ll call a Fox)
- NBC (Thimble which represents Jay Leno’s chin)
- Raj Rajaratnam (The Battleship or Galleon)
- Bernie Madoff (The Sack of Money: Deluxe Editions)
First up is The Auto Industry. Representing the Auto Industry is Ford, GM, and Chrysler. You may remember their CEOs made the trek to Washington in 2008, looking for money to bail them out in hopes that they could get more federal funds to stem the bleeding from the recession. They did. So, here’s their turn.
CHANCE: Elected Chairman of the Board. Give yourself a bonus, cut workforce production, go bankrupt and be replaced.
Next up, Wall Street. With the TARP funded bailout last year, one would hope that Wall Street would have learned their lesson and been a better boy this year. Not likely, After lavish retreats and continued bonuses, we realized that the bailout really didn’t trickle down all that much. Yeah, the country didn’t go under and the Earth continues to turn, but even in paying back TARP funds, some banks look to make a profit by cutting the interest and passing along the bill to you.
CHANCE: Your Xmas Fund Matures. Pay back loans early and deny the hand that feeds you with stock prices that cut the amount of money paid back leaving you a profit. Get out from under the thumb of the government so you can go back to paying bonuses for suits and cosmetic changes to your offices. Continue to bend public over a chair as mortgages continue to be foreclosed on in America.
Third in turn is Fox. Fox has gone on such a high this year thanks to the addition of the show glee. However, this is the same company that managed to shift good shows to Friday night’s graveyard while relying on American Idol to win them all the money in the world. That and they copyrighted the word “glee”, but that’s another story.
CHANCE: That’s right. Fox doesn’t take chances. They just cut and run when shows aren't performing that well. The fan club of Dollhouse thanks you.
Next up, NBC. NBC has long been considered one of the best networks. After all, with shows like Law & Order, The Cosby Show, Cheers, ER, Friends, and The Tonight Show in your stable, you must have been doing something right, right? FlashForward to September 2009 and you’ll see why they are in contention.
CHANCE: Advance token to nearest high roller cable company and offer to be bought while simultaneously killing your schedule by doing away with 10pm dramas in hopes that Jay Leno will bring everyone over to watch his new show. Honestly, if Comcast gets controlling stock of NBC, you will see tons of issues. Think about wanting to watch your favorite show and seeing the TV Guide list a four block of time when it might show up.
Raj Rajaratnam, you’re up. Raj has taken time out of his busy schedule today of pleading not guilty to 11 counts of insider trading and we thank him for that.
CHANCE: You’ve been given insider information. Now that’s not even remotely a real card, but then again, we are dealing with a hedge fund. Raj denies benefiting from insider information dealing with a merger between IBM and Sun Microsystems. That non information led to a non million dollar windfall for Raj’s funds. Being a relatively non player in the game of nonsense, Raj is no match for our final contestant.
Bernie Madoff, come on down. As you can see, Bernie is being led to the board in a wonderful orange jumpsuit. That’s because Bernie has already been convicted of running the biggest ponzi scheme this side of organized religion. He managed to ruin more people’s lives than the Internet.
CHANCE: Go Directly Back To Jail, You D-BAG!
The list of Madoff’s d-baggery is so extensive will be in jail for the next two lifetimes and that’s still not enough punishment. There is a special level of Hades for this d-bag and I hope he’s made friends with the sisters on the inside. I’d love to hear that voice over being done by Morgan Freeman.
Today’s match brought to you by Cash4Gold and other fine scam artists.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Chase-ing Your Own Tail
In the ongoing battle between debt and myself, the tide is ever turning. One day I’m the dog and the next day the fire hydrant. I have managed to control costs by eliminating a lot of personal debt leaving only a car payment, a mortgage, and two credit cards to finish before I can feel accomplished. While one card has a small amount that is usually paid off before the bill is due, the other is the sum of my life’s work. Its balance carries with it the various threads of idiocy over the years as I opened one card, transferred a previous balance and attempted to pay it off before the year of 0% interest could expire. Then, my wife tagged along, and soon we had three cards going at once, all carrying a balance that finally became aggregated into one card through Chase Card Services.
Of those three credit cards I’ve carried, I will say that the GM Master Card has been the kindest of creditors. My National City Visa is sitting there waiting for me to use it, and my wife’s Discover Cards are collecting cobwebs, which is how I like it. Quite frankly, I would have never even opened a credit card if I hadn’t decided to buy a house in 2004. I opened a Visa card, bought something and paid the balance when it was due. I started to establish credit with that single purchase and since then everything has gone downhill. We’ve moved from one card to another carrying a portion of a balance that started three cards prior. I slowly began to whittle down my debt.
First off was my GM card which I could use to get cash towards a car purchase. Once I finished off the major balance on that card from the Ghosts of Christmas Past, I decided to help my wife pay down the Chase card. It contained the remainder of our credit card debt attributed to her previous cards and I thought I’d be a good husband and help pay it down. What started out as progress turned into a dance with the devil, and I was leading.
Now, my wife and I are two different types of payers. She likes to physically mail a check each month to Card Services, while I like to use the online services to schedule payments directly from my checking account. I can set it and forget months at a time. Also my wife likes to pay things over time, disregarding the huge finance charges on our existing balance, whereas I like to take every extra cent I can allocate away from other things and throw it at the principal along with monthly payments. To tell the truth, I spent the last four months sending GM a payment of about $20 a week just to keep from having a bigger payment at one time. They (HSBC Card Services) might have hated seeing those transactions once a week, nibbling away at my balance, but I was able to free up my thoughts towards other issues and not take a huge hit in the wallet while doing it.
I know a lot of people who will side with my wife when it comes to seeing a physical bill, sending a physical check, and knowing that you took care of it instead of setting up complex payment schedules based on the tides and phases of the moon. Yet, I can take off my shoes and count up all the times she has come to me and said, “Oh, crap! I forgot to send the check. Can you pay it online tonight?” “Yes, dear.” I would say and two minutes later I had an email thanking me for my payment.
However, my lifestyle did not allow for one thing, a single digit, left off the end of my checking account. My wife paid a little more than the minimum payment each month and in the middle of the month, I would send in an additional payment online. I thought everything was fine until I noticed that the balance of the card was climbing and my checking account statements weren’t showing debits toward the card. I logged into Chase’s online service and saw that each month there was two line items from my account. One was asking for a payment. The other was returning the payment. Additionally, there was a $39 returned payment fee showing up alongside the reversals. After two months, I had accrued $117 in charges to the account.
For the most part, I regard mail as a privilege. When I open the mailbox and see a stack of envelopes I get a little excited. Once I get inside, however, I lose more and more of that excitement as I sift through garbage and junk mail. A lot comes from credit card companies looking to snag you into their web of deceit. Even some of the mail comes from your own credit card companies touting a low interest rate for transfer of balances or other services. These usually get shredded or thrown into the fireplace for kindling. So, it came to pass that I disregarded two small perforated card stock letters informing me that my account had returned a payment because there was a problem with the account. When I did notice them, I took it as an error on their part, not mine. After all, I’d been using that checking account for almost 20 years. I’ve never had problems with them before. In fact, last year, Comcast…another good honest friend of mine…*cough* rip off *cough* decided to not draft a payment from my checking account, one month, and then drafted $300 the next month. The reason they cited was that there was a problem with my checking account. Further investigation revealed the error on Comcast’s side of the board. I called my financial institution and they had no record of an attempt to draft off my account. Apparently, Comcast has technical glitches between the keyboard and the seat all the time and I had to suffer for it. I treated this issue with Chase as the same problem, they screwed up.
Another month went by and another letter came. It happened again. My wife decided to call Chase for some answers and after going round and round over the matter, she handed me the phone. When I spoke to the customer service agent he told me that the account in question could not be found. Now that was a different story than problem with the account. Problem with the account infers that the account is there. You can see it, touch it, taste it, smell it, but it has a weird flavor and looks to have gone bad, recently. The account not being found means that you’ve walked to the fridge, opened it up and asked “Where’s the Sunny D?” After hearing, “Did you check behind the milk?” and “Well, is it behind the soda?” you realize that you’re all out. It wasn’t until the agent had me read my checking account number to him that the problem became clear. They were looking in the fridge of my life for Sunny D and found Tang. In other words, when I entered in the account information to set up the payments, I dropped off the last digit on the end of the account number.
Playing on the sympathy of the economy I pleaded with the agent to forgive the charges as it was apparent that we were trying to pay the card, but the account number was too short. He said that due to a policy change he couldn’t forgive the charges but gave me the name and address of the VP of card services at Chase in Ohio. He told me to write a letter asking for the charges to be dropped and said that only he could do it.
So, we’re off to see the wizard and I’ve even brought along the witches broom in the form of statements showing the payments and reversals as well as the payment schedule proving a difference in account number from the payment account for the problem payments as well as the corrected account number at the top. We’ll just have to wait and see if the wizard is nothing more than a humbug.
To top things off, I just checked the account and a message had shown up in my inbox. Back at the beginning of the month, I sent them a message asking about the charges. They finally replied, deducting one of the charges from my account. Well, apparently, the guy manning the online stuff has a little more power than the guy on the phone. Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt.
What a world. What a world.
Of those three credit cards I’ve carried, I will say that the GM Master Card has been the kindest of creditors. My National City Visa is sitting there waiting for me to use it, and my wife’s Discover Cards are collecting cobwebs, which is how I like it. Quite frankly, I would have never even opened a credit card if I hadn’t decided to buy a house in 2004. I opened a Visa card, bought something and paid the balance when it was due. I started to establish credit with that single purchase and since then everything has gone downhill. We’ve moved from one card to another carrying a portion of a balance that started three cards prior. I slowly began to whittle down my debt.
First off was my GM card which I could use to get cash towards a car purchase. Once I finished off the major balance on that card from the Ghosts of Christmas Past, I decided to help my wife pay down the Chase card. It contained the remainder of our credit card debt attributed to her previous cards and I thought I’d be a good husband and help pay it down. What started out as progress turned into a dance with the devil, and I was leading.
Now, my wife and I are two different types of payers. She likes to physically mail a check each month to Card Services, while I like to use the online services to schedule payments directly from my checking account. I can set it and forget months at a time. Also my wife likes to pay things over time, disregarding the huge finance charges on our existing balance, whereas I like to take every extra cent I can allocate away from other things and throw it at the principal along with monthly payments. To tell the truth, I spent the last four months sending GM a payment of about $20 a week just to keep from having a bigger payment at one time. They (HSBC Card Services) might have hated seeing those transactions once a week, nibbling away at my balance, but I was able to free up my thoughts towards other issues and not take a huge hit in the wallet while doing it.
I know a lot of people who will side with my wife when it comes to seeing a physical bill, sending a physical check, and knowing that you took care of it instead of setting up complex payment schedules based on the tides and phases of the moon. Yet, I can take off my shoes and count up all the times she has come to me and said, “Oh, crap! I forgot to send the check. Can you pay it online tonight?” “Yes, dear.” I would say and two minutes later I had an email thanking me for my payment.
However, my lifestyle did not allow for one thing, a single digit, left off the end of my checking account. My wife paid a little more than the minimum payment each month and in the middle of the month, I would send in an additional payment online. I thought everything was fine until I noticed that the balance of the card was climbing and my checking account statements weren’t showing debits toward the card. I logged into Chase’s online service and saw that each month there was two line items from my account. One was asking for a payment. The other was returning the payment. Additionally, there was a $39 returned payment fee showing up alongside the reversals. After two months, I had accrued $117 in charges to the account.
For the most part, I regard mail as a privilege. When I open the mailbox and see a stack of envelopes I get a little excited. Once I get inside, however, I lose more and more of that excitement as I sift through garbage and junk mail. A lot comes from credit card companies looking to snag you into their web of deceit. Even some of the mail comes from your own credit card companies touting a low interest rate for transfer of balances or other services. These usually get shredded or thrown into the fireplace for kindling. So, it came to pass that I disregarded two small perforated card stock letters informing me that my account had returned a payment because there was a problem with the account. When I did notice them, I took it as an error on their part, not mine. After all, I’d been using that checking account for almost 20 years. I’ve never had problems with them before. In fact, last year, Comcast…another good honest friend of mine…*cough* rip off *cough* decided to not draft a payment from my checking account, one month, and then drafted $300 the next month. The reason they cited was that there was a problem with my checking account. Further investigation revealed the error on Comcast’s side of the board. I called my financial institution and they had no record of an attempt to draft off my account. Apparently, Comcast has technical glitches between the keyboard and the seat all the time and I had to suffer for it. I treated this issue with Chase as the same problem, they screwed up.
Another month went by and another letter came. It happened again. My wife decided to call Chase for some answers and after going round and round over the matter, she handed me the phone. When I spoke to the customer service agent he told me that the account in question could not be found. Now that was a different story than problem with the account. Problem with the account infers that the account is there. You can see it, touch it, taste it, smell it, but it has a weird flavor and looks to have gone bad, recently. The account not being found means that you’ve walked to the fridge, opened it up and asked “Where’s the Sunny D?” After hearing, “Did you check behind the milk?” and “Well, is it behind the soda?” you realize that you’re all out. It wasn’t until the agent had me read my checking account number to him that the problem became clear. They were looking in the fridge of my life for Sunny D and found Tang. In other words, when I entered in the account information to set up the payments, I dropped off the last digit on the end of the account number.
Playing on the sympathy of the economy I pleaded with the agent to forgive the charges as it was apparent that we were trying to pay the card, but the account number was too short. He said that due to a policy change he couldn’t forgive the charges but gave me the name and address of the VP of card services at Chase in Ohio. He told me to write a letter asking for the charges to be dropped and said that only he could do it.
So, we’re off to see the wizard and I’ve even brought along the witches broom in the form of statements showing the payments and reversals as well as the payment schedule proving a difference in account number from the payment account for the problem payments as well as the corrected account number at the top. We’ll just have to wait and see if the wizard is nothing more than a humbug.
To top things off, I just checked the account and a message had shown up in my inbox. Back at the beginning of the month, I sent them a message asking about the charges. They finally replied, deducting one of the charges from my account. Well, apparently, the guy manning the online stuff has a little more power than the guy on the phone. Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt.
What a world. What a world.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Cult of Wessonality
Politics is a slippery slope. You grease the wheels for months, garnering support for your cause, and when you get a hold of the brass ring people expect results. I’m not even talking about the ones who paid for it. I’m speaking of us, the general public who made the call. Unfortunately, instead of being patient while plans are set in motion, we’re looking for instant gratification and so is the ticker on Wall Street.
The economy is in the outhouse and most of America is in the poorhouse. Well, not everyone. The tenet of “He who dies with the most toys wins” is alive and well in America. In recent weeks, there has been more fingers of shame pointed at bad behavior then ever were, domestically, in the past few years. To equate to an office environment, the Obama administration is calling everyone into the break room and informing us all that we are all required to work more efficiently and cut down on expenditures. Usually, the boss wouldn’t name names in public. He’d address the group as a whole allowing the guilty parties some anonymity in order to change their actions but folks from AIG to GM are still thinking that the Administration is talking about someone else and continue to do business as usual. Finally, Obama had enough and publicly called out AIG for its bonus scandal and also asked Rick Wagoner to step down as CEO of GM. Both of which have had polarizing effects on the public and the economy.
Then the question arises, should Obama have done it? Is this positive movement towards that ‘change’ thing he spoke of for months prior to the election? In a word, yes. There are those who think that it’s not the job of the White House to make these requests. However, who’s job is it? It’s obvious that the reason we are in this mess is because no one bothered to watch the trends. It’s not just the fault of the previous administration, but it’s their fault that is wasn’t stopped sooner. The fact remains that this is a country of the people, for the people, and by the people and we have every right to question what we think is wrong, whether you are for the current administration or against it. Either way, we gave the administration the right to cover our asses.
When we elect an official to put our best interests forward, we give him/her the power to speak and act on our behalf. When that entails our tax money being used to bail out troubled corporations, whether they deserve it or not, the official exercises, by proxy, our wishes. Therefore, we and the elected official acquire the ability to make that call. Now, the President can ask for the resignation of Rick Wagoner, but it was up to the board of GM to approve it. There is the rub. Everybody talks about how this is the first step towards Socialism when all it is calling out someone for farting in the car. As long as you ignore the problem, Stinky McGee will keep letting them rip.
Then there’s the case of Bank of America wanting to spend TARP money on sponsorships for sports deals. Well that’s just great. We just gave Jack our only cow to sell and he came back with magic beans. It’s like giving someone money to pay off their debts and instead of doing just that, they turn around and try to double it at the craps table. I didn’t spend my stimulus check or tax refund on scratch and win tickets. I paid off some debt and bought some items for the home. I stimulated the economy.
Maybe we’re asking for too much here. Maybe bailing out these big companies was a bad idea. We hoped that by shoring up their assets, they’d help grease the frozen wheels on the economy and get it going forward. Instead of doing that, perhaps a better message to them would have been to reap what they sowed. Of course, letting them fail would have been the first domino in a huge That’s Incredible display that would have made things worse. Yet, everyone was so quick to get the TARP money out to stop the bleeding that nobody bothered to make sure that we were stitching up the wounds and not just putting a band aid on it. There should have been some provisions on how the money was spent. Grants given with some language attached that specified the purpose of the money. Instead we gave Joe, the copy room guy, an expense account and sent him to Vegas for a conference. Now, AP is looking over Joe’s expense report and asking, “What the hell is this $500 charge for special services?”
Here in Pittsburgh, we faced a similar situation. The city was given a grant in the neighborhood of $400 million dollars, to construct a tunnel from the main part of the city to the North Side. The purpose was connecting downtown with the main sporting areas and a new casino that is being built near them. In a time when the city was in jeopardy of losing a major hockey franchise, needed a new arena constructed for sporting and other events, and also needed major overhauls to the transportation system and road infrastructure, it seemed silly and irresponsible to spend that kind of money on an underwater tunnel for an underused light rail system. Yet, that is what the money was allocated for by its donors. We didn’t have a choice. We either had to use it or lose it. So, drilling and construction began on what is called the North Shore Connector.
Now, there is talk that it may not be completed because of a ballooning budget due to materials and the poor economy. Still, the money, given to the city, was specified for a certain project. Not like the drink tax or Onorato tax, as we like to call it, which give the city the ability to add a 10% tax to alcoholic beverages in order to pay for the Port Authority’s budgetary expenses. When the final tabulation was made at the end of its first year, there was a huge surplus beyond what was forecast. Instead of using that money for its intended purpose, Onorato wanted to spend the money on other projects like bridges and roadways. This was met with huge amounts of criticism because the opinion of instituting this tax in the first place was a major point of contention with residents who were then threatened with the idea that if they don’t pay the drink tax, property taxes have to go up. Let’s say the shoe was on the other foot and the Bar and Restaurant Owners Association was hurting for money. If the Port Authority had added a tax increase on transit fares to help them out, which they would never do, and the Bar and Restaurant Owners Association decided to use that money for other expenses instead of their budgets and payrolls, there would have been a major uproar over the issue.
Now, in the case of public opinion over the economy, we need to either be a little more patient and make more concessions. This was my biggest fear when Obama was elected. Not ‘what’ he would do, but how we would perceive it. We believed in change, yet we want someone else to do all the work. We need to take a little more responsibility for making things happen. That goes for unions, CEO’s, and everyday Americans. Our short attention span approval ratings need to get a reality check and we better start realizing that we need to be the force behind change. The coach can call the plays. He can design them, inspire us with a rousing “Gipper” speech, and give us all the tools for success, but ultimately, we have to go out on the field and win the game. For once, in a long time, there has been no glossy film put upon a Presidential Administration. We got what we asked for and there’s been no attempts to hide any actions. It’s just time for us to grease the wheels a little bit on our own and make the country go a little smoother. Thing is, we all have to give it a little push.
The economy is in the outhouse and most of America is in the poorhouse. Well, not everyone. The tenet of “He who dies with the most toys wins” is alive and well in America. In recent weeks, there has been more fingers of shame pointed at bad behavior then ever were, domestically, in the past few years. To equate to an office environment, the Obama administration is calling everyone into the break room and informing us all that we are all required to work more efficiently and cut down on expenditures. Usually, the boss wouldn’t name names in public. He’d address the group as a whole allowing the guilty parties some anonymity in order to change their actions but folks from AIG to GM are still thinking that the Administration is talking about someone else and continue to do business as usual. Finally, Obama had enough and publicly called out AIG for its bonus scandal and also asked Rick Wagoner to step down as CEO of GM. Both of which have had polarizing effects on the public and the economy.
Then the question arises, should Obama have done it? Is this positive movement towards that ‘change’ thing he spoke of for months prior to the election? In a word, yes. There are those who think that it’s not the job of the White House to make these requests. However, who’s job is it? It’s obvious that the reason we are in this mess is because no one bothered to watch the trends. It’s not just the fault of the previous administration, but it’s their fault that is wasn’t stopped sooner. The fact remains that this is a country of the people, for the people, and by the people and we have every right to question what we think is wrong, whether you are for the current administration or against it. Either way, we gave the administration the right to cover our asses.
When we elect an official to put our best interests forward, we give him/her the power to speak and act on our behalf. When that entails our tax money being used to bail out troubled corporations, whether they deserve it or not, the official exercises, by proxy, our wishes. Therefore, we and the elected official acquire the ability to make that call. Now, the President can ask for the resignation of Rick Wagoner, but it was up to the board of GM to approve it. There is the rub. Everybody talks about how this is the first step towards Socialism when all it is calling out someone for farting in the car. As long as you ignore the problem, Stinky McGee will keep letting them rip.
Then there’s the case of Bank of America wanting to spend TARP money on sponsorships for sports deals. Well that’s just great. We just gave Jack our only cow to sell and he came back with magic beans. It’s like giving someone money to pay off their debts and instead of doing just that, they turn around and try to double it at the craps table. I didn’t spend my stimulus check or tax refund on scratch and win tickets. I paid off some debt and bought some items for the home. I stimulated the economy.
Maybe we’re asking for too much here. Maybe bailing out these big companies was a bad idea. We hoped that by shoring up their assets, they’d help grease the frozen wheels on the economy and get it going forward. Instead of doing that, perhaps a better message to them would have been to reap what they sowed. Of course, letting them fail would have been the first domino in a huge That’s Incredible display that would have made things worse. Yet, everyone was so quick to get the TARP money out to stop the bleeding that nobody bothered to make sure that we were stitching up the wounds and not just putting a band aid on it. There should have been some provisions on how the money was spent. Grants given with some language attached that specified the purpose of the money. Instead we gave Joe, the copy room guy, an expense account and sent him to Vegas for a conference. Now, AP is looking over Joe’s expense report and asking, “What the hell is this $500 charge for special services?”
Here in Pittsburgh, we faced a similar situation. The city was given a grant in the neighborhood of $400 million dollars, to construct a tunnel from the main part of the city to the North Side. The purpose was connecting downtown with the main sporting areas and a new casino that is being built near them. In a time when the city was in jeopardy of losing a major hockey franchise, needed a new arena constructed for sporting and other events, and also needed major overhauls to the transportation system and road infrastructure, it seemed silly and irresponsible to spend that kind of money on an underwater tunnel for an underused light rail system. Yet, that is what the money was allocated for by its donors. We didn’t have a choice. We either had to use it or lose it. So, drilling and construction began on what is called the North Shore Connector.
Now, there is talk that it may not be completed because of a ballooning budget due to materials and the poor economy. Still, the money, given to the city, was specified for a certain project. Not like the drink tax or Onorato tax, as we like to call it, which give the city the ability to add a 10% tax to alcoholic beverages in order to pay for the Port Authority’s budgetary expenses. When the final tabulation was made at the end of its first year, there was a huge surplus beyond what was forecast. Instead of using that money for its intended purpose, Onorato wanted to spend the money on other projects like bridges and roadways. This was met with huge amounts of criticism because the opinion of instituting this tax in the first place was a major point of contention with residents who were then threatened with the idea that if they don’t pay the drink tax, property taxes have to go up. Let’s say the shoe was on the other foot and the Bar and Restaurant Owners Association was hurting for money. If the Port Authority had added a tax increase on transit fares to help them out, which they would never do, and the Bar and Restaurant Owners Association decided to use that money for other expenses instead of their budgets and payrolls, there would have been a major uproar over the issue.
Now, in the case of public opinion over the economy, we need to either be a little more patient and make more concessions. This was my biggest fear when Obama was elected. Not ‘what’ he would do, but how we would perceive it. We believed in change, yet we want someone else to do all the work. We need to take a little more responsibility for making things happen. That goes for unions, CEO’s, and everyday Americans. Our short attention span approval ratings need to get a reality check and we better start realizing that we need to be the force behind change. The coach can call the plays. He can design them, inspire us with a rousing “Gipper” speech, and give us all the tools for success, but ultimately, we have to go out on the field and win the game. For once, in a long time, there has been no glossy film put upon a Presidential Administration. We got what we asked for and there’s been no attempts to hide any actions. It’s just time for us to grease the wheels a little bit on our own and make the country go a little smoother. Thing is, we all have to give it a little push.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
McScrewed
Bailouts.. TARPs… Recession… Stimulus… No matter how you label it we’re a little McScrewed. I use that term because that’s probably where I’ll end up working with the way things are going. The government seems fit to throw money at organizations that have shown they can’t be trusted with money. The promise is that the Federal Government is giving IOU’s to banks to stabilize credit and in return they pay back the loan with interest. In theory, there should be a profit.
Now, I don’t know about you, but the last time I used an IOU was when I was a college student and a little short on cash around the holidays. I used my student computer account and Photoshop to create these little “Coupons” for my parents that basically stated that I would clean out the garage or wash the cars instead of buying them a present. That was 15 years ago and I never did make good on those IOUs. So, how do we know the banks will pay back the Government? In essence, the Government just became Fannie Mae and the banks became the American homeowner who bought a sub-prime mortgage.
For the most part attitudes have changed but still people are conducting shady business as usual. John Thain, there’s a guy we’ve all read about in the news, he was the Merrill Lynch CEO that used $1.2 million dollars to renovate his office and gave out billions in bonuses to executives days prior to the sale of Merrill Lynch to Bank of America. In his defense, he cited that a lot of the losses Merrill Lynch suffered were due to his predecessor. Ok, the man had a $1400 garbage can in his office. You tell me who is to blame for this? Oh, and his answer for why he gave the bonuses, “if you don't pay your best people, you will destroy your franchise.” Well, guess what, Bucko. You were supposed to be the best and you almost destroyed the franchise.
This type of mentality doesn’t surprise me when you hear about all the rumblings along Wall Street in response to President Obama’s decree that salaries will be capped at $500,000 for executives of companies receiving TARP funds. Now, there is anarchy and bedlam in the board rooms as executives find themselves suddenly in a salary freeze. What to do? What to do? Rudy Giuliani has said that if you take away bonuses and incentives from these people that the rest of New York will suffer from reduced patronage at restaurants and other establishments. Sorry, Rudy, but these guys aren’t going to McDonald’s or even Houlihan's and they aren’t creating unemployment buy losing a few zeroes in their paycheck. They already created unemployment by letting their companies become so screwed up.
Look, if you are a company that is going to the Government and asking for millions of dollars to help keep you afloat then you need to tighten your belts, too. Guess what? Everyone else has to so don’t think we’re picking on you guys. My salary got frozen along with a lot of other folks’. You’re going to have to start living like the rest of us. If you can’t, then you’ve proven our point. You work for a financial institution for pity’s sake. Did you not learn how to manage your money? Now, if your company was solid and didn’t need financial assistance from the TARP, then by all means, do what you want. By that token, you should be acting responsibly and mindfully of the economy. If anyone believes we’ve already seen the bottom of this hole, then they’re just as delusional as bonus backed bankers.
Just like we, as regular taxpaying, nine to five working folks need to realize that everything didn’t change in November. You try stopping a speeding locomotive on a dime. It’s impossible, even for Superman, and sorry to say, Obama is not Superman. No one is. It’s going to take a lot of time and patience to slow this speeding train and get things working properly. Unfortunately, we are an short attention span audience. We want something to happen right now. We want our credit lines to be fixed, our jobs saved, and our President to wave a magic wand and make all the bad people go away. An economic stimulus package won’t solve all the problems. In my opinion, I don’t think I’ll be getting one of those rainbow sherbet looking checks with the Statue of Liberty on it. I think this package is more for the businesses that give us our other checks, the ones we get every other week. That’s so we can keep getting them. This isn’t a hand out. This is an opportunity to create jobs to fix roads and bridges. It’s a chance to upgrade our cities instead of building up on the degraded infrastructure that has been allowed to lapse into the old standards of the 20th and in some really depressed areas, the 19th centuries.
Is the Government doing the best they can for the nation. I hope so. I don’t think you can narrowly point to one man, one company, or one administration and say, “Shame on you.” This has been allowed to go on for years and people figured, it’s only wrong if you get caught. Somebody out there screamed and waved their arms, trying to be heard as the voice of reason and was ignored as is usually the case in any disaster movie. Well, now the economy could be the basis for a new Michael Bay or Roland Emmerich film, in fact they’re probably sitting around trying to figure out how to work in huge explosions to take out their fictional Fannie Mae’s or Lehman Brothers. Be sure that Hans Zimmer is firing up the synthesizers trying to find the right set of chords to play as President Obama, as played by Will Smith or Jamie Fox, slowly stands up with that stern look on his face as the camera pans up and around him in slow motion. This is the moment you’ll be waiting for because that when he’ll get pissed and go on the offensive, taking out bankers left and right without having to reload. Once you wake up and realize that life is not a movie, albeit almost a bad one, you’ll go back to your job, look at other companies’ postings and wildly throw your resume about hoping that one of them is in better shape and willing to hire you.
If you think that throwing money at the problem will make it go away, then all you’ll do is live from bailout to bailout, stimulus to stimulus, and we’ll be right back where we started when this whole mess reared its ugly head. We all need to be aware that it’s going to get worse before it gets better. We need to change our course as individuals whether we make $500,000 or $50,000 a year. We need to realize that when it does get better, it won’t stay that away. We need to be ready for the next big hole or out of control locomotive, otherwise we’ll be saying “Would you like fries with that?” instead, “I’d like to supersize that.”
Get your own McScrewed shirt or magnet here.
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