go on take the money and run

I hate banks, I wish I could take my money and run away from them. I've never understood banks. I'm giving them my money to keep safe, they are allowed to make money off of my money, don't really have to give me anything in return, and then charge me to get at my own money. Plus they are constantly coming up with new and exciting offers that in the end will only make them more money off of me.

I called my bank because of two concerns, the first being that I wanted a new copy of my credit card. The stripe has worn out on mine and in some stores, and quite frankly I'm fed up waiting while some 16 year is trying to figure out how to take a paper imprint of my card, because the scanner won't read it. These kids have no idea that for years all credit card transactions were done on paper carbon slips. Finally, someone above the age of 25 will show up and teach them how to do it.

The second reason that I had called was that as I was checking my statement online I noticed that nothing had been posted to my card for almost two weeks. Now, I had been spending money so this didn't make sense.

I finally got a hold of a person, told them about the second reason that I was calling and was told that was because a new card had been issued to me two weeks ago, with a new number. I hadn't asked for either. They were doing it for security reasons (the Winners losing credit card numbers fiasco). I was also told that my current card is only good for six more days, yet I have still not received the "new" card.

I also asked about my automatic payments and charges. "Oh, you'll need to change all those, and you should do it in the next couple of days otherwise they won't go through anymore." I expressed my lack of pleasure with this, and that I hadn't asked for any of this and I was told, "Well yes, it is inconveeeeenient, but not as inconveeenient as FRAUD!" I explained that there had been no fraud so really this was just inconveeeeenient for me. I don't think he appreciated my tone, but I didn't appreciate him turning inconvenient into a 20-second long word.

I asked the question that since CIBC had arbitrarily made this decision, could they not have spent some of the hundreds of millions of dollars of profit on sending us all a letter first, letting us know what would be happening with our accounts. In reply I was told, "Well there's a letter with your new card." I pointed out that I had not received the new card, and that is the flaw with their thinking.

I really wish that when the little recording tells you, "your call will be recorded for quality assurance and may be analyzed for customer service," you had an option to press 1 for a copy of the recording of this call, or at the end of the call, have "press 7 to have the recording of this call listened to by someone who can actually do something for you."

Unfortunately it seems I am only ever faced with the option of "press 666 to remain in customer service hell".