July 27, 2010

Finacial Wizard I Am Not!



I often wonder what it is about banks nowadays. Why do I generally detest them?

They are not like the ones I knew way back in my childhood. The clerks and the bank manager; all of them knew you by your first name. All you had to do is pick up the phone; if there was an overdraft, they would wait until your pay check was deposited and you were covered. If they charged you a fee it wasn't over a couple of dollars. Generally speaking you were not charged.

Banks were in the business of making money but they showed real respect towards their customers and would do everything they could to help them out. I was told by my Mother that in the late 20's and early 30's when peoples farms were being foreclosed it was different in Unionville. Our bank manager in town bent over backwards so that his customers could stay in their homes. Because of him not one of our local farmers had to sell and move away.

I had a bank account at that bank from age 6 to 13 and at another branch of the Bank of Nova Scotia in Toronto right until I was in my 20's. Trouble didn't start with the banking system till after my 50th birthday. It started after my husband died in 2001.

I have always had my own money and my own account whether I was single, married, divorced or widowed. Well, if it hadn't been for some really good friends in the last 9 years; because of overdraft fees here with the state side banks I might not have made it financially. Now it isn't because I over spent. It was because of the way banks operate nowadays. For example: They know you get a check in by say the 30th of the month. They also know that you need to eat the day before and instead of waiting until the day you get paid they charge you an overdraft of thirty dollars on 5 or 10 cents over the limit. That is the sort of thing that has caught me up for the last 9 years. It is absolutely ridiculous! I reckon that I have lost well over $10,000 in those 9 years to that bank in Oklahoma.

My point is these people don't know you well or try to get you to know you well. The clerks are over burdened with duties and people are very strained in business relationships these days. Neither do I live in Unionville anymore. I live on Long Island, New York but I have to tell you; the manager at my local branch seems to be the kind of fella we had at the Bank of Nova Scotia when I was a child. Perhaps this bank will treat my money like mine not theirs.


Note: Found out what is wrong with my legs. I have chronic osteoarthritis. It can't be cured but the pain can be managed and I am not giving up or in on this.