Tuesday 11 December 2007

Financial shenanigans

Further to my rant about electronic banking we have now given up trying to electronically transfer the funds for the second stage payment to the New Boat Company and have done what we should have done in the first place, regressed twenty years and sent a cheque. Lisa could send an electronic transfer of five thousand but any more than that was impossible. Going into the bank proved even more frustrating and they demanded £20.00 to transfer any more than £5000. Why? It's our money. They'll probably stop the account, return the cheque and investigate us as Columbian drug dealers (no disrespect to Colombians though. I'm just stereotyping. Not all drug dealers come from Columbia. Probably very few actually).

Why can we transfer £5000 without incurring charges but any more demands a fee of £20.00. Lisa, not known for her calm demeanour (she is from a council estate after all), remonstrated with the cashier in raised tones and then stormed out for dramatic effect, came home with a face like bulldog chewing a wasp and shouted at me for even more drama. But I reminded her of what she said before leaving that very morning, when I was having a rant about the same thing, “It could be worse, we could be dead”. Needless to say it didn't go down particularly well.

More and more agencies and companies are quoting security as the reason for messing us all about. Security against terrorism, security against fraud, security of our personal details falling into the wrong hands. They are relying on fear to keep us in check. But I'm not frightened. I most certainly am not. Not in deepest, darkest Leicestershire. They won't give us our own details quoting the Data Protection Act but throw them in the bin for anybody to find. We are not the ones who leave bin bags full of confidential bank details outside waiting collection by goodness knows who. We don't lose 25 million citizens personal details in the post, we don't sell DVLA details to any scronk who owns a vehicle clamping company. We need security from the incompetence of both government and big business. And I've just heard on the BBC (that oracle of all knowledge) that two more government agencies and a trade union have lost even more personal data.

We have now both decided to claim all of the 'illegal' charges that have been imposed upon us over the last six years by our relevant banks, dependant the the outcome of the test case going to the High Court on the 14th January next year. Do these people think we floated down the Ashby canal in a saucepan (that's as close to a canal reference as you'll get here). I'm beginning to sound like Victor Meldrew now.

And another thing..............

5 comments:

Mo said...

Love it, love it, love it!!!
Sharpen the axe.
I see we aren't allowed a cutlass any more, too many used in gang fights for the rest of us to be trusted with them.
I think we all ought to get our H.M Gov't Terms & Conditions out of the drawer and check the small print, I seem to remember a clause that said they promised not to release our details to any one except to relevent departments within the Company and those departments in Companies in other countries owned by the Company and those departments belonging to Companies linked to said Companies by way of business and those having an interest in the Companies mentioned or controlling interests in the Company and to any official or non official departments requiring said information for security and anti fraud purposes withersoever they shall be located. Those not falling within the scope of the Company or affiliated Companies or Companies for marketing purposes will definitely be denied access only if you have remembered to tick the box on page 13.

Well that's the gist of it which means we've had it mate.

Mo

Pete said...

I think you'll find that ticking the box on page 13 triggers the distribution of your details to the Russian mafia. I't's the box on page 14 you want to tick.

Waterrat said...

I don't believe it !!

Sorry - Victor Meldrew reference!!

Mo said...

No, I didn't used to either......

Has anyone tried to extrapolate to see where all this nonsense might end?
Dooooooohhhhhhh !!

Mo

Pete said...

I think we already know the answer to that. George Orwell told us in 1949 what would happen in 1984. He was only out a by a coupel of decades.