Royal Bank of Scandalous (aka Scotland)

Regular readers of this blog will know that I made atrocious experiences with the Royal Bank of Scotland. For the record, the stuff-up the bank caused months ago during a stay in San Francisco has still not been rectified. Even my branch manageress thinks that the organisation's conduct has been shameful at best.

Having declared my personal conflict of interest, I should probably also mention that I continue to monitor this record profit making organisation for further evidence of truly scandalous conduct. And indeed, given half a chance, the Royal Bank of Scandalous (as a reader of this blog renamed the organisation) will almost certainly jump at it.

Well, here's what's happening. Just like other organisations, the company requires that its staff also buy its products. Any of its staff members caught not having a bank account with the Royal Bank of Scotland will be subject to disciplinary procedures. I don't understand why the company's staff would be so recalcitrant. Is it because they know better than most of us how crappy the bank's customer (dis-service) really is? May be they don't want to wait months to see an apology for bad service and some kind of compensation? After all, the bank pretty much instantly charges the living hell out of you if you overdraw your bank account. If they (by their own admission) mistakenly drain your account of money, they quite happily charge you (yes, you!) instantly. They then fail, months after having punished you for overdrawing an account that they accidentally drained, to compensate you or fix the mistake.

Of course, I shouldn't be unfair. There are plenty of other companies requiring their staff to buy their products. Rolls Royce for instance demands that its staff drive only Rolls Royce, and so do Bentley, Jaguar and Mercedes Benz. Come to think of it, thousands of Lufthansa staff were recently disciplined for flying other airlines. Worse, McDonald's staff seen with a Burger King burger in their hand will be shot on the spot by McDonald's Staff Monitoring Services. - OK, I guess you realise that I made these stories up. I also hope you get the point that I am trying to make. Take the opportunity to cancel your account with the RBS when you have a minute. As a bank it fails to provide decent customer services, and as an employer it undoubtedly sucks big time. Move on while you can.

More from the US of A

For what it's worth, the Royal Bank of S (see posting below) was never heard of again, and I am quietly preparing for another day at the corner of Market and Powell. At least I know which credit card to cancel the day I get back to Scotland. - Bunch of jokers.

So, while I have plenty of time to watch TV in-between begging stints necessitated by incompetent Royal Bank of Scotland staff, I thought I might as well keep you posted on the oddities of US political life. And yes, you guessed it, other than the Obama vs Clinton question (ie Blackish vs Womanish - two possible firsts for the US presidency), sex is high on the agenda. The US being the conservative country that it is, has long been preoccupied by sex (a fixation only matched by older guys working for the Catholic Church - you can spot them wearing funnily colourful robes, and usually talking non-stop about sex [mind you, something they claim they don't have]) . US gay campaigners' primary policy issue is access to 'gay marriage'. Typical, if there's a law saying only straight folks may burn their hands on glowing/hot oven plates, only gay folks would start a campaign to achieve the same right. I am AGAINST gay marriage. What exactly is progressive about extending access to a failed institution to gay people? It is - at best - intellectually dishonest for anyone (usually at very young age) to promise to someone they know only a little to stick together with him or her until 'death parts' them. Close to half of all marriages fail, and there is an even larger number of unhappy marriages, yet gay folks busily campaign for a 'right' to more of just that. I think the civil partnership idea put into action in the UK and many other countries is the most sensible way of going about this. If two (why not more?) people want to give each other particular rights of access to each other's assets, visitation privileges in case of illness and such things, the state should support those decisions in some form or other. Marriage is fundamentally a religious exercise and should be eliminated from the state's statute books altogether. If you want to get married, grab your local priest and take it from there. The state has no proper business in this thing called marriage.

What's interesting about the US debate that's currently on the TV is the take some gay activists have on a recent Washington Supreme Court ruling. The court argued in its majority opinion that the state has an interest in upholding the institution of marriage (and limiting access to it to straight folks) because of its procreative character. Well, leaving aside for a moment that it wasn't love that was foremost on the judges minds but baby production, a gay activist is now campaigning to limit marriage to only those couples that actually have produced children. The thing is that it's not only many gay folks who are reproductively challenged but also 1 out of 4 married couples. So, the gay guy, attempting to show the idiocy of the majority opinion, argues that these marriages should be disssolved. Well, good on him and good luck to his cause (not that it's one I would support, but surely his argument is ingenious).

Well, there's a few other funny stories in the national headlines, but this should do it for now. Gotta get back to my begging corner at Market/Powell.

Some bad news from the Royal Bank of Scotland

I am currently in California. Haven't been to San Francisco for a very long time. I love this town.

Well, on to the Royal Bank of Scotland. Guess what, my credit card was declined just yesterday. This happened after I went out of my way to call the bank prior to going here so they'd not use unusual transactions overseas as a reason to shut down the card. Its call centre staff thanked me for being so considerate. I also transferred extra cash from my cheque into my credit card account to ensure I don't run out of money while in the USA. Well, yesterday my card didn't buy me a five quid brunch in the hotel bar. I sort of have to concede that I cursed (quietly) what I thought were incompetent hotel staffers. I tried then to ring my bank to find out why my card was declined. Goes without saying that I had to call at 4:30 am local time so as to catch someone working in the UK based call centre. Of course, the hotel had since cut my outside phone line, seeing that my card wasn't valid. So, the toll free call to my bank had to be made from my mobile and cost me probably a small fortune. After spending probably 5 minutes in a (likely) expensive (for me) queue I got thru to a call centre operator. It quickly became clear what happened. I am a victim of a suitably incompetent call centre agent. When I called to top up my credit card balance (with a transfer from my cheque account) the call centre staffer decided instead to move a large chunk of money from my credit card into my cheque account. The result is that I travelled to the USA with a carefuly drained (and, in fact, overdrawn) credit card account. I'm sure the bank has since busily levied charges for my overdrawn credit card... guess it's a typical case of let the buyer beware.

The bank is currently trying to fix the problem (at least on the phone its staffer acknowledged straightaway that it's their fault), but it could be a couple of days till my card would be back in credit.

Begging is fairly common in this country, so if you see me today on the corner of Powell and Market street, spare me a dime while I wait for the Royal Bank of Scotland to fix its mistake. One has to eat after all ...