I became aware that my world was beginning to crumble when our bank lost my husband’s £50 deposit.
‘Look David, they’ve left that £50 off our bank statement!’ I cried, when book-balancing day came around.
‘Never mind,’ he said, puffing away contentedly at his pipe. ‘I’ll get them to check their books the next time I go in. Here, see – it’s entered in our deposit book with the amount and date and everything.’
‘Where’s your copy of the deposit slip then?’ snarled the lady at the complaints desk, a ratty soul I think they employ specially for this sort of thing.
I have a nice husband, a good, reliable man but he does have one tiny fault. He is inclined to clean his pipe with any little pieces of paper he finds about his person. So what more natural than that he should make a neat little narrow tube out of his copy of the deposit slip to waggle peaceably through his pipe stem. And that was that. No slip, no recourse. We came away with the impression that somewhere backstage a computer had swallowed the whole distasteful mess and, once down the tubes, we’d had it.
I don’t know what old Ratty said to the computer after we left but shortly after this, it sent us two totally out-of-date credit cards. Then our holiday currency arrived two weeks after we’d actually left the country.
‘Here comes the troublemaker,’ we distinctly heard Ratty hiss, as David once again made his way to the Complaints’ Corner.
Then we changed banks.
The next one had beautiful flower arrangements on low tables. When, in the course of conversation, I made it known to the manager that I’ve never, ever been in the red, he sprang to his feet and shook me warmly by the hand. I don’t know if this fact caused them to file me under ‘Trusty’ but shortly afterwards I received in the mail a mysterious, bulky parcel containing dozens of bundles of assorted foreign currency with the names of local inhabitants attached. ‘So this is what New Zealand bank notes look like!’ we cried. ‘And these are your actual drachmas. And guess what? Miss Harrison of “The Beeches” must be off to Mesopotamia!’ Then we realised that the banks were closed for the weekend.
‘Just hang on to it all in a safe place until Monday,’ said an accountant friend. At one minute past opening time on Monday I sidled backwards to the counter, beady-eyed and sweaty-palmed, with the loot carefully secreted about my person.
‘Oh yes, we wondered where all that lot had got to,’ said their chap, tossing it nonchalantly over his shoulder.
I know that there are people around who maintain that, overall, the world is steadily improving. But in my youth, banks were unquestionably the absolute cornerstone of all that was fine and true and upstanding.
I grew up on stories called ‘The Tale of the Missing Halfpenny’ in which all the staff stayed resolutely at their desks until midnight, if needs be, until the books tallied precisely and the missing halfpenny came to light.
‘He’s got a splendid job with a bank!’ my mother was always saying stirringly to me and to my brother, as all sorts of totally admirable young men strode soberly past our gate. Since my brother was about three at the time and I was around seven, we were much too young to be actively seeking employment and/or a husband. But doubtless she wanted to get the pair of us thinking along the right lines as early as possible.
Nowadays, however, one has only to mention the word bank to just about anybody and all sorts of strong views and soul-searing experiences come to light. Is there anybody, anywhere, for example, who can honestly say that they find the catch-us-open-if-you-can banking hours convenient?
‘Attitudes have changed so much,’ sighs a friend. ‘They used to treat me as if they really valued my account. But now I get “Our computer never lies – and if it does, hard luck!”’
‘They should be firmly reminded,’ says another, spirited soul, ‘that they are, after all, only money shops!’
One lady I work with has an unnerving tale to tell. It just so happened that her husband had the same name and initials as another chap who banked at the same branch. And this other chap emigrated. And my colleague and her husband discovered one fine day that all their money, their holdings, their valuables, everything, had been transferred to Australia.
Or take my next door neighbour who sometimes gives me a lift to work in the mornings. Occasionally he rings me up and says could we start out earlier as he has to drive round to the bank and get some cash out of the machine? This machine is set into the wall outside his particular branch, for the greater convenience of customers who can’t get to the bank during opening hours. He has said this to me on perhaps ten different occasions. So off we go and he leaps from the car and punches out his magic number, at the same time feeding his magic card into the appropriate slot. It is a very de-luxe machine, of amazing technological complexity and, on one memorable occasion, the required cash did magically appear.
On all other occasions the machine has eaten his card/punched him back/flashed up a sign saying ‘A/C closed’/spat his card back already been jammed with someone else’s card/shredded his card completely/flashed up a sign saying ‘Go Away!’/trapped his finger.
‘I hate banks!’’ he screams, jumping back into the car, shaking all over. And I must say I do see his point.