Monthly Archive for November, 2007

Drama, Drama, Joy

Victor went to get his paycheck for October on the first this month and when he got back home he told me about what happened at the office. His one coworker announced that their boss had been in a terrible car accident the night before and was in hospital…

That following Saturday Victor had taken me to the bank to get a new debit card and then do our grocery shopping for November. After I was done at the bank he told me that his pay check had not cleared yet as the bank was not able to get a hold of his boss for authorization.

His boss is stupid. He pays all of his employees with personal salary checks instead of normal paychecks because it “saves him money” to do it his way, or some bullshit.

Victor told me that the bank will take up to ten days to clear the check if they are not able to get the account holder’s authorization. So we couldn’t go to the supermarket and buy any groceries because we didn’t have any money to do so. But I bought some bread, meats and fruit with the money I had and have been doing so with whatever money I get and that Victor’s father sends us for the time being.

Since a few days after had Victor’s father been trying to get a hold of Victor’s boss but when he found out that he was in a certain hospital and was “unresponsive”, Victor’s father relaxed a little. But when he called the same hospital the following day, the hospital had “no record” of that man, Victor’s boss being admitted to that hospital. Some of the other employees also couldn’t get a hold of their boss; they too wanted the money that they had worked for…

Then that one coworker disappeared; the one that announced that their boss was admitted to hospital. No one could get a hold of her or anything. So obviously the situation became suspicious and Victor and a few of his coworkers filed a case at the police station against their boss and will be suing him not only if their pay checks don’t clear, but for the inconvenience and whatever else.

Victor has not been going to work because the police have closed down the workplace and have a couple of guards on the property to “catch” the boss or whoever tries to enter and collect anything from the boss’s house as the workplace is on the boss’s residential property.

Drama, drama, drama!

So Victor has been searching for a new job because he had been working at this DVD company as a sales rep, was working long hours, loads of hours of overtime and did not like it.

Until now because Victor just got home from a job interview… He got the job! He studied accounting and now he gets to do just that; he’s so happy. I’m happy for him too.

Things seem to be getting better!

Hello Again, FNB

I went to FNB on Tuesday morning to find out why my account had been closed and what exactly had happened to the funds that were in my account. Again I was in the shorter queue but after standing there for over twenty minutes, I decided to just go over to Absa and open a savings account there and deal with FNB afterwards. So I opened an account at Absa and after that that I went to FNB, saw that the queue I needed to be in was much longer and then just came back home because I didn’t want to stand in that queue for God knows how long.

I came back home and said to Victor, “You know, I should’ve opened a new account at FNB because I know that their SMS notification is free. Absa charges me what? 40c or something the lady said?” I went online to Absa’s website to read about the new account I just opened with them and compared it to the one I wanted to open at FNB. Internet banking, cell phone banking and SMS notification is free with FNB and none of those are free with Absa. Like to use Absa’s internet banking facility, you have to pay about R20 per month and the SMS notifications are charged at 40c…

Why should I pay for something when I could get it for free somewhere else?

So the next day I went to Absa and closed my account. I then went over to FNB and after a few minutes of standing in the queue a consultant walked up to me and asked what I would like to do. I told him that I wanted to open a new account because mine had been closed and he told me to come over to his desk where I would be able to open up a new account. Before we proceeded with opening my new account, I asked the consultant if he would just check and tell me what had happened with my account that had been closed.

I give him my old account number and he checks… He tells me that it was closed and that I did in fact have no funds in the account at the time it was closed. He showed me on the computer monitor that I had withdrawn the last of my funds a few months ago.

I thought that I had some money in there and also thought that the money my friend, David wired to me had already reached the account a couple of days before the account had been closed. I thought wrong!

Now I have a new account at FNB and plan on keeping it active.

Oh and I should also start putting my savings into there and not my piggy bank… That includes all the five cent coins I have in that thing!

STFU FNB!

I went to the bank on Saturday morning to get a new debit card because the one I possessed had expired. I was waiting in the short but slow queue for more than thirty minutes and noticed that some people from the long but moving queue for the “Express tellers” came and took my place at the “New cards” teller. That pissed me off so I complained to a supervisor and was taken to one of the tellers to get my new card.

I tell the teller that I need a new card because mine had expired, so she takes my ID book and old card to the back, I assume and came back along with my new card. She sits down and starts “linking” the new card and PIN to my account and after a few minutes she excuses herself because she brought the wrong card. So off she goes to the back and returns after several minutes and proceeds to link the card and PIN again with this other card.

She types away on the keyboard in front of her and hisses every time after she hits enter. She tells me that she can’t get the card linked to my account and will call her supervisor to help her. Her supervisor comes over and shows the teller what she was doing wrong and walks away as the teller begins to link the card again, “Please don’t go…” whines the teller to her supervisor, but she doesn’t listen. After a few minutes the teller hands me my ID book, new card and PIN receipt and asks me what I would like my ATM withdrawal limit to be.

She asks me if R2000 is fine, well it sounded like she said “two thousand”, I wasn’t sure so I asked “R2000?” to verify. She nodded and I said yes. I then have to sign for this ATM withdrawal limit and before I do I noticed that it showed 1000 instead of 2000. “Wasn’t this supposed to be two thousand?” I ask the teller. “I asked if one thousand was ok and you said yes.” I tell her that I asked for a limit of R2000, not R1000. She then makes it so and I sign for it, thank her and walk away with Victor and my new debit card.

I log onto the website that night to register for online banking and get an error after submitting my registration saying, “The card number and PIN do not match.” So I try it once more and it gives me the same error. I don’t even bother to try a third time because it says that three incorrect entries will result in a cancelled card. So I email the FNB support about this issue.

This afternoon I got a call from an FNB support agent. She asks me for my account number to check what’s wrong on their side. She then asks me why they gave me a new card when they were going to close my account, which was yesterday. I asked her why my account had been closed and she tells me it was due to inactivity over thirty days…

After that call, I get on the phone and call the branch where my account was held and asked why they gave me a new card… Only to close my account yesterday due to inactivity over thirty days when there were times I had not used my account for a few months at a time and only now they want to close it… And what had happened to my funds?

Well you are going to have to come here and talk to someone about it or open a new account. Enjoy your day, goodbye.

That was the only response I got before the woman hung up the phone.

What the fuck?

Tomorrow Victor is going to take me to that FNB branch to find out what is going on and see if I can get my account reopened. If not, I’m going to Absa to open a new account, I think.

I don’t remember how much money I had in that account of mine and if there was any, I want it back. Plus last Thursday I had over R1000 being wired into that account via MoneyBookers from my friend, David. If that money had gotten into my account before FNB closed it, I am going sue them because they “stole” it and secondly, I didn’t get any notice in regards to my account being closed.

I am not in a good mood at all today.

Oh but last night for dinner, I ate the best bolognaise I had ever made. Definitely the best I had ever made.