Bohemian Delilah

For the curious, I’m sitting in the library listening to one of the most interesting cell phone conversations I’ve ever heard. It almost makes me sad that some people are considerate.

I’ve been loathe to discuss this here, because (1) it makes me look incredibly childish and stupid and (2) I really like the bank I’m discussing and do not really want to spread bad things about them…even if they are true. If the situation isn’t fixed in the time I’ve recently been told it will be fixed, I will most likely be starting a boycott and warning others against joining, as at that point it really will be this bank’s fault, and no other. Now I’m sharing because I’ve just had enough and need to vent, also I feel that my story may warn others about the dangers of not keeping paperwork.

We’re going to call the bank I like, MB, which stands for My Bank. It is a large bank. I mean, mega-large. You’ve heard of this bank. We’ll give the other banks different names as I see fit. I’ll keep my own name. The part of Tom will be played by Bill the SugarGlider.

When I left home at 18 to go to college I opened a bank account with the Boston Branch of Acceptable Bank. AccB was the bank my Dad used, or one of them. They had ATMs at my school, which made my mom feel safer. They had a good college student plan, which included an overdraft protection account. I’d never had to live off my own back account, having only savings accounts with SmallTown Bank up to this point, so overdraft was a great thing.

Over the years AccB was eaten up by Fabulous Bank, which, after I’d been with them for two years developed the World’s Greatest ATMs for two months, upon which it was eaten by People’s Insanely Stupid Savings. PISS was the crappiest bank ever. Nearly everyone who has had this bank has left. (Except my dad, who had two accounts with them when he died. I contend that he didn’t feel like dealing with something as ephemeral as a bank account, but the truth was he was incredibly stubborn and I doubt he would have given up on a bank just because it charged him for online banking and continuously messed up on a number of things.) I immediately closed my PISS account and moved to Citizen’s, which had been US Trust, the greatest bank in the entire world. I never had a US Trust account, but if you talk with people who had you hear the longing for a similar bank in their voice. They talk about it like someone who’s died, like a brother. I feel for the people who had a US Trust account, they will never be satisfied with another bank again. (Of course, this could just be the people I know, I’m sure every bank has it’s downside.)

This is where the lesson comes in. I never kept the paperwork for closing my PISS account. I’m sure I kept it for a little while, but I got rid of nearly all of my paperwork when I moved from Boston to San Francisco. Never do this.

Because now, 4 years from leaving Boston, and, to my recollection, 5 years from closing my PISS account, PISS has come back from the dead to screw me over.

My credit report has taken a dive. Not for any of my doing, but because when PISS was sucked up by MB they decided that that overdraft account was overdrawn. I’ve seen no information stating that it was, only heard from MB that they took money from the overdraft account to pay for an overdraft from the PISS checking account. This is information I got in November, when I asked for all of the information to be sent to me. I was told it would be, only the people who told me this never informed the people who would be sending me the information. This is an oversight I can forgive, or at the very least overlook. I mean, it could just be the single person.

Y’know the bits in TV shows (I’m thinking particularly of a Dharma and Greg episode I watched while sick where Dharma tries to fight city hall on some bill) where a character is sent up and down from one floor to the other until finally she is sent back to the original person, creating an effective loop preventing any information from being shared? This is what happened. And when you see the loop form, or rather hear it on the phone, there is no hotter fury that can burn in your heart. My Bank set this loop and then sat back as I ran through it over and over again in November, and again in January, when I spoke with them at the beginning of the month. They claim that no one knows what they’re doing because PISS was such a poor bank. And I can accept that. I’ve had other problems with MB that were solved quickly, that took no effort on my part at all. Customer service, until now, really did seem to serve the customer. PISS, well, maybe it infected MB.

Only that week in January, I was told I would receive a call back, and this one woman was so rude to me she made me cry, and they didn’t seem to understand that all I wanted was proof that I owed this money. I wanted to see the bank statements that never found me, though I’m sure I gave them my new address when I moved (remember kids, Save Those Documents). I never received the call. Each time I’ve been told someone would contact me, or that they’d have an answer if I’d call back in a week, aside from one key individual whom I will worship as a saint for days, I’ve never heard back or I was unable to contact the person who said they’d have an answer. This seems odd to me.

And, y’know, I paid the contested amount when I first heard of it. Because I was afraid this would happen, and I need to apply for a school loan every three months. If this dragged on and I hadn’t paid, that would be longer for my credit report to be awful (I’m currently contesting the credit rating without MB’s help), and for me to be denied loans. I’m wondering if my not paying, however, would have put the impetus on them to show proof. Maybe then they would care at least a little. It’s just, it wasn’t a huge amount, and I worried that MB would eat me up, just like it ate PISS and PISS ate FB and FB ate AccB. That’s what seems to happen with banks. They eat you.

And these are the dreams I’ve been having, running around naked (because of course I just gave a presentation in school), with only my paint supplies to defend me, trying to ward off this huge conglomeration that’s grinning, “But Del, we’re your BANK, we support you. We make your money do things.” It’s pointy teeth drip change and the sweat of the working man. The fork in its hand is made of gold. Sometimes I trip and it eats me and I’m left talking with my telephone about why I need to dial a new number. Other times I get my money and shove it under my bed and yell at it “There’s your interest! Make money off of me now!”

I’m at a loss for what to do, aside from being extra careful that I keep all correspondence regarding changing addresses and closing accounts, and calling as often as I can to get this information. Originally I’d been told that once I had the information I’d be able to go into any MB branch and get the my money back (another funny thing is that I was told if I went to an old PISS branch they’d be able to pull up my statements, though the customer service computers aren’t hooked up to these files the old PISS branches are — this is funny because PISS was only in MA, and I’m in DC and no matter how often I say this — to the same person — no one seems to understand I’m not going to drive to MA for PISS) and at that point they’d recind the bad point on my credit rating report.

And I need that money. I’m broke. (Hi, have we met? I’m a college student, living with my grad-student fiance.) But more than that I need to not have points on this stupid little paper (I guess, now, it’s more of a bunch of computer bits).

And how can I prove I don’t owe this money? In 2002 I was afraid that someone had gotten ahold of important identity information. I got my credit report and stopped credit card companies from allowing me to get credit cards without specific proof. I kept that paper, and it shows that I owed no money to either the PISS checking or PISS overdraft accounts. Not knowing that the account was still opened I never touched it. Erego: I don’t owe them money. But, as we all know, this isn’t proof. You can’t prove that you DIDN’T do something. Only that you did.

Tomorrow I’ll be calling them back for another round of Pop Goes the Weasel. The Weasel represents my Brain. The Mulberry Bush is my belief in MB. “Fun” really means to the immense pain of its customers and it’s own enjoyment at their suffering. And of course, the Monkey is My Bank. My own fucking Bank. These days really make me feel valued as a customer.