In the old days a gentleman would have been well advised not to venture anywhere without a coat of mail, for he never knew when somebody would sneak up on him and thrust a dagger in his back.
Nowadays it is a rather unlikely event, but you probably have more to fear than yesteryear, for today’s assassins are stealthier and deadlier. They strike under the cloak of darkness and their weapon of choice is the Internet.
Today many people do their banking electronically and that’s where danger lurks. When you opt (as encouraged by the banks) for automatic bill payments, you basically authorize the bank to help itself to your cash. You are implicitly saying: take as much as you want my friend… And financial institutions are not shy about helping themselves.
If you are not watchful, they (like mosquitoes) will bite you repeatedly, and stealthily suck your blood like the little nasties. And you will feel the pain and the annoyance way after the facts when it becomes almost futile to complain.
Case in point: a few months ago I parked $10,000 in a bank. They told me that I also needed to open a checking account (a mere formality) with a minimum deposit of $100.00. Fine I said, no problem.
Imagine my surprise when two months later I noticed that my friendly bank was charging me a maintenance fee of $8.00 per month.
I gave them $10,100 to use as they please (to lend to some other suckers and charge them a hefty interest) and they had the gall to charge me a fee for authorizing them to use my money.
When confronted, the bank meekly agreed to remove the charges, but if I had not caught their shenanigans, tough!
I don’t think that anybody has more gall than banks!
And maybe not…
Some outfits will raise their rates without any warning and if you give them a blank check, they will happily take advantage of your generosity.
If you are using automatic payments, you need to scrutinize each bill and loudly complain if something doesn’t look kosher.
If you fail to do so, you will be fleeced without seeing a thing, and that’s what banks are hoping for.
Trust us my friend, they keep saying, trust us…
Well, like Ronnie used to say, “Trust, but be damn sure to verify!”
Like yesteryear you still need to wear a dense coat of mail.
Alain