Yesterday afternoon, around 1:30 pm I drove down Mission St.
to the location of my Chase bank. It
took awhile to find a parking space, as it usually does on Mission in the
afternoon; or anytime for that matter. I
did get lucky once I found a spot though; someone had left 23 minutes on the
parking meter. In San Francisco, where
parking is at an extreme premium finding a meter with time left on it is like a
confirmation that karmic retribution actually exists. In my opinion, when things like that happen it’s
more a proof that god exists than the most common reasons devout’s usually
give.
Ahh…parking. It always proves to take San Franciscans on a
complete tangent off the main line of their conversation….moving along…I parked
about 50 yards from the bank and was able to walk there in about 3
minutes. Thankfully no one was in line
for the ATM so I breezed right in.
My local Chase branch located at Mission and Ocean in the
San Francisco Mission district had just been finished being remodeled. I can only assume this was a result of the
switch from WAMU to Chase.
I stroll in and the first thing I notice is the lack of
envelopes anywhere near the ATM. I naturally walk to the little table they
provide with deposit slips and that sort of thing and to my surprise find no
envelopes.
As I’m gazing at the ATM from about 10 feet away I see a
sign on the ATM. It reminded me of a sale sign in Safeway. It said “Deposit Friendly ATM.” My initial
reaction was “o.k, I thought all ATM’s were deposit friendly, isn’t that the
point.”
What I soon realized this was a nod to their new envelope
and deposit slip less ATM idea. Which
sounded good enough as I swiped my card and began picking my options. The screen told me I could deposit up to 50
bills at a time. I someday wish I have
enough money to that…I guess I could use 50 one dollar bills just to do
it.
On this trip I was only depositing a single 100-dollar
bill. The slot opened up and I slipped
the bill in to the tune of the screen telling me to please wait…which ended up
being famous last words.
Of course it spit the money back out and said “some of your
bills were unacceptable, please go see a checker for assistance.”
The slot opened up again so I tried again to the same
result. It would only allow you to try
the deposit three times before automatically canceling your request. Which is a safety measure I imagine in case
someone else is trying to use your card.
I stood there while people came in and got in line behind me
and attempted to put my single bill in the ATM for about 20 minutes. It continually spit the bill back at me 21
times before I got so frustrated that I at least walked into the bank to see if
I could quickly see a cashier. Too add injury to insult my buddy called me in the middle of all theese shenanigans and I told him why I was frsutrated and he said "oh man, thats old news buddy." That pissed me off even more...not because of what he said but because it was old news that ATM's are harder to use now. New ideas aren't alwasy better.
Of course there was about 15 people in line and everyone knows
banks, similar to the DMV are notoriously slow at serving anything. I decided to try again at the ATM. At this point someone had walked in and I had
to wait in line for a few minutes.
As I stepped back up to the ATM with a renewed sense of
hope, it was quickly doused when again the ATM spit my 100 back at me six
times.
The whole time I reading the new signs on the ATM….Deposit
friendly ATM…and laughing at the corporate world. Corporate America, to me, encapsulates almost
all aspects of backward thinking I have ever seen.
In my entire life of dealing with ATM’s I have never once
had an ATM tell me it couldn’t accept my envelope. Never once!
I’m sure in part to save money and in part to be part of the
“green” revolution this brain child idea seem full proof to some dolt in an
office somewhere who has so much money he hasn’t been to an ATM in years
because his fucking accountant takes of it all.
But for the guy, like me, on the street it is not convenient.
Two reasons why this envelope and deposit slip less ATM idea
is a bad one…
1. Most
people remember their first experience with things. Whether that experience is good, bad,
o.k makes a huge difference whether people are willing to put themselves
back in that same situation. This
was a terrible first experience and I will probably bitch about it for the
rest of my life. As I mentioned
earlier I have never had a problem with an ATM taking an envelope full of
money.
2. I was
depositing a 100-dollar bill. My
bank is located on Mission st. in San Francisco. For those who haven’t ever been here it
has a reputation for not being the best area at night to hang around. Now when I go into my bank I just have
to hold my cash out while I continuously try to slip into the ATM that for
some dumbass reason refuses to take it.
This is like asking to get robbed, especially if the ATM won’t take
the money and you have to leave with it.
To me this idea seems like a no brainer. Remember that old
saying; if it’s not broken don’t fix it.
Well that applies here. The ATM’s
take envelopes, where you can hide how much cash your depositing, why would
anyone think envelopeless is better?
