With big banks making more and more money while the people the banks are, on paper, supposed to provide a service for those who make less and less, I took the advice, nay, heeded the call of the Occupy Movement and opened an account at a local Credit Union. That act took about 10 minutes and went smooth as proverbial silk. Closing my bank account, however, was nothing short of a full-fledged and utterly ludicrous fiasco.
I should start by saying that the bank I trusted my money to is not one of the major offenders (Citi, BoA, Chase or Wells Fargo), but it is owned by a major European banking conglomerate and has been gobbling up smaller financial institutions for years, tightening its stranglehold on the public's money. Not that I'm majorly concerned that it wasn't American - we are increasingly becoming a global society by the second and there's nothing I can do stop it at this point. What did bother me was the ridiculous amount of money they have ($65B last I checked), and the fact that they were charging me $15 a month just to have a checking account. Not a huge amount of money to be sure, but that's a ten-spot and a half that I would rather spend on, well, anything except the "privilege" of having a freaking debit card.
So I walk into my local branch to seal the deal and move on. The branch is one of those weird buildings that always seems much larger on the inside than it appears from the outside. It's a long foyer surrounded on either side by small, but not tiny, offices. The bank tellers stand on the wall opposite the entrance, and the drive-thru window is visible from said entrance. But the walk always seems lengthier than I'm sure it is, and they warily watch every time I approach. Maybe it's the tattoos, which are still a bit out of place in suburban Houston. Anyway, they only watch, never acknowledging my existence until I'm right in front of them. I suppose they're hoping I won't notice them and approach another clerk, but that just may be me being paranoid.
Today, however, was different. In my righteous zeal to close my account, I'd raced out of the house without my checkbook. Not that big a deal, I have my account number in my wallet, I just needed to fill out a deposit slip. Of which there were none to be seen.
Finally, since it was obvious I was looking for something, one of the bank tellers asked if she could help me with something. I went into that branch fairly regularly and I'd never seen her before. She was smiling and seemed genuinely eager to help, so I assumed she was new.
"Yeah," I said, "I'm just looking for a deposit slip. I need to cover an overdraft so I can close my bank account."
Her countenance fell. Her smile was gone. She looked at me maliciously, like I'd just kicked her puppy and laughed at the wounded creature.
She told me to sit down and someone would be with me shortly. I didn't dare help myself to a complimentary cup of coffee. God knows what the bank personnel would think of me then. After a short wait of about 15 minutes in a deserted bank lobby, a middle-aged, tall Hispanic woman stepped out of her glass office and bade to me come in.
We made short introductions and she asked, "How can you assist you today?" She too was smiling and pleasant.
I told her that I needed to cover an overdraft and close my account. Her stricken change of demeanor was more drastic than that of the bank teller. This time, it wasn't a reaction of horror and incredulity. It was a look of disgust, like I'd just crapped in her purse and handed it back to her with a grin.
"Oh, God," she groaned as she sat down, "You're not another one of those Occupy idiots, are you?"
Not expecting that kind of treatment by a customer service representative, and a manager at that, I was honest. "Well, I haven't made it down to the protests as often as I like, but I definitely support the cause and the reasons behind it."
"What is the cause?" she shot back. "I just see a bunch of stupid thugs acting like fools."
"Well, there are a lot of things happening that have nothing to do with the real reasons for the Occupy Movement, and some of the things that are happening are beside the point and definitely not helping the cause or people's perception of it. But many of the organizers and spokespeople are very knowledgeable and I think they have a valid point."
She looked at me for a second and said, "My gun says different." This was a such a tangential non-sequitur, I had no idea how to respond. Did a bank branch officer just say "gun" at their place of employment? I guess it was a good thing I hadn't poured myself a coffee. Before I could say anything, she added, "And I will make it my personal mission to see that you never have another checking account again."
"I feel like I was just passively threatened and that I should call the cops," I should have said, and should have done. Instead, I sat there and stared at her for a minute or two. My mouth, I'm sure, was agape. I did manage to get in a smug, "I've already opened another account," before I left, damned if they were going to get any more money from me.
Some of the above is true, some of it hyperbole, but the point is, I feel like - and I'm trying to come up with an original spin on "it's the banks that have the guns pointing at us" metaphor, but I can't think of one, so let's just go with that. Why should I have my financial future threatened just because I want to take my meager funds elsewhere?
Besides, the bank manager is in no way the 1%, so what's her beef with me? Does she get less of a year-end bonus if a client jumps ship on her watch? Maybe. But she acted as though she was affronted by my reasoning for closing my account, not the actual fact that I was attempting to do just that.
Shouldn't she be directing her anger at the executives of the industry she works in that jacked the economy through financially malfeasant (and in some cases downright criminal) acts that caused an economy already so burdened by over-spending that it couldn't afford to lose a dime to collapse in on itself? Shouldn't she be mad about the massive government bailouts, a goodly portion of which ended up lining the personal pockets of said executives. The average pay of bank branch managers is roughly $50,000 a year, according to glassdoor.com. That's a good amount of dough to myself and many of my peers, over-educated for what we are doing, which is mostly settling for under-employment, or worse, nothing at all. But that salary, as attractive as it is to many, puts her nowhere near the 1%. The executives of some the same institutions that cause this fiscal crapstorm to begin with took home millions in bonuses on top of salaries well into the higher six digits.
Get your $15 from one of them, lady.
