There are many reasons to dislike banks. I’ll give you one.
The other day, I went to cash a check written out to EPautos – which is me. It’s my business account. An extremely supercilious teller – Diapered, of course – droned at me about how she could not cash the check. That I “had to” deposit it my account but could not withdraw the funds. I would have to transfer the funds from my business account to my personal checking account.
Never mind that both are my accounts. There is no “boss” or other person involved in my personal or business accounts. Both are me, myself and I.
Now, this bank had never given me guff before about just cashing a check, whether made out to EPautos or Eric Peters – a difference without a distinction and in addition, what sort of bank doesn’t let the owner of an account cash checks made out to the owner’s account?
I had to argue with this Face Diapered termagant for a good five minutes before she grudgingly gave in and had the gall to lecture me – the owner of the account – that “next time” they would not cash checks made out to my account, which is the same as saying to me.
I considered demanding they cash out both my accounts on the spot – but didn’t because doing that would surely trigger some sort of Hut! Hut! Hut! action, as it is clearly evidence of evil-doing and white supremacy, generally, to withdraw one’s own money from the bank.
And this is why I hate banks.
They regard owners of accounts as pleaders they may deign to deal with, if the pleaders do as they are told. The concept of the customer is as dead as that of probable cause. You will stand in line and do as they say with your money, which they consider theirs. It is like pleading with a parent for one’s allowance.
May I have some of my money, pretty please?
Worse, banks are narcs.
Your business is the government’s business – and banks are the bridge between you and it.
Banks are not custodians of your money. That is incidental. They are monitors of your money – and your activity. Of what you have and what you do with it. This including completely legal actions such as withdrawing money – which above a certain sum triggers “suspicion,” which is sufficient to trigger the Hut! Hut! Hut! – in the from of locking-down or simply seizing your money, it being then up to you to prove (using your own money and your own time) that what you did wasn’t “suspicious” – a term left up to the government to define.
The smart thing to do would be to disassociate completely from banks – in order to regain control over your money. In order to not have to beg to be allowed to withdraw it. In order to be free to use it as you wish without the using creating “suspicion,” leading to a Hut! Hut! Hut!
But this is largely unfeasible, given that without a bank it is very difficult to transact business – even in cash. Because most transactions above the incidental and occasional involve checks, as in paychecks. It’s true, of course, that some payments for services are also in cash, but these are generally of the picking strawberries variety performed by “illegal aliens,” who – irony lost on most freedom lovin’ Americans – enjoy more real freedom that most Americans.
The illegals are free, as a matter of everyday reality, to drive a car without a license or insurance and to get paid in cash and pay no taxes on what they are paid – because there are no meaningful consequences for them. To suggest they should be applied – as they are applied to Americans (assuming Americans aren’t to be allowed the same freedom) is, of course, extremely racist and white supremacist.
But they are applied to most Americans – because most Americans have a bank account and other things which can be taken away from them at the arbitrary whim of government, often triggered by banks or in collusion with banks. They are not going to resist an order to “lock down” your account – they will gladly help the government and even prompt the government to do it.
And that Diaper-wearing termagant behind the plexiglass has the power, as she wishes to exercise it, to make your life miserable by withholding your money or siccing the government on you for what she regards as “suspicious” activity involving your money.
It’s not going to change the reality of things, but there is a great scene in the largely unknown Chevy Chase movie, Nothing But Trouble. There is a character in the movie who hates bankers – and has just the thing for them.
I, too, have a dream… .
. . .
Got a question about cars, Libertarian politics – or anything else? Click on the “ask Eric” link and send ’em in!
If you like what you’ve found here please consider supporting EPautos.
We depend on you to keep the wheels turning!
Our donate button is here.
If you prefer not to use PayPal, our mailing address is:
EPautos
721 Hummingbird Lane SE
Copper Hill, VA 24079
PS: Get an EPautos magnet or sticker or coaster in return for a $20 or more one-time donation or a $10 or more monthly recurring donation. (Please be sure to tell us you want a magnet or sticker or coaster – and also, provide an address, so we know where to mail the thing!)
My eBook about car buying (new and used) is also available for your favorite price – free! Click here. If that fails, email me at EPeters952@yahoo.com and I will send you a copy directly!
Have you noticed that the worst customer service experiences are always with companies and organizations that are most regulated/controlled by government. This creates a cartel and which leads to horseshit service.
Here’s my quick list of offenders:
Medical care
Banking
Insurance
Cable TV
Financial services
Education; primary and secondary
Utility companies
Telecommunications
Feel free to add any others I’ve missed.
Airlines are the absolute worst of the worst.
Fiat-paper “money” Owners just lend it to the herd of modern slaves…
Haha, “Face-diapered termigant”! 😀 You’re continually appending my lexicon, Eric, especially appreciated when it comes to arcane, derisive terms.
With regards to banks, I once asked to withdraw $6k with which I might buy some land, and I thought it might be persuasive to have cash in hand. They spent a few minutes counting the coffers, it appeared, only to come back and tell me they didn’t HAVE $6k. WTF? What bank doesn’t have $6k? I guess most of what they “have” are electronic credits, to be created as necessary. It was an illuminating experience.
“What bank doesn’t have $6,000?” I’m guessing most don’t have cash on hand anymore. Due to the war on cash, that came from the war on drugs and terror.
Which you’d be well-advised to AVOID having on hand, especially if travelling by AIR. A fat wad of cash will be discovered by the TSA officers, and though their authority is supposed to be limited to inspecting you and your luggage and maintaining order in the terminal and airport concourses, especially in the screening area, they WILL confiscate the “illicit” cash on “suspicion” that it alone portends criminal activity, and turn it over to the FBI and/or state/local LEOs, who will invent some BS case to justify KEEPING it.
If you have a bankroll on you (which you might want to go to a casino and hit the tables, or you’re buying a spare engine or a cheap car, where “cash talks” and “BS walks”), and you’re “happily motoring”, at least until you see the “bubblegum machine” light up, make sure the cash is ON YOUR PERSON, but HIDDEN. Of course, you’re taking my standing advice to record, Record, RECORD the encounter. If you’ve stuffed the bankroll into the glovebox, or under the floor mats, or the seats, or, “heaven forbid”, a “hidden” compartment, the “copper” will take that as reasonable suspicion that you’re up to no good. Sure, unless the money or other “contraband” has to be in PLAIN VIEW in order to sustain a sweep of the passenger compartment, but cops often just demand you step aside and barge in. Likewise, you DON’T have to open the trunk or toolbox, sans warrant, but again, often they just open them anyway and get huffy that you DARED to stand up for your 4A rights.
In general, in order to search YOU, the cops must have either a warrant, or, “probable cause”, based upon incidents at the scene, to ARREST you, or have an arrest warrant from a COURT. Sure, cops can and often do simply fabricate the justification, or brazenly make an unlawful arrest, especially for “sassing” them (“contempt of cop”), and THEN they can search your person (“search incident to arrest”). If they didn’t start out by arresting you, but merely did the “pat down”, hitting a pad of cash, as it does NOT reasonably indicate a weapon (the entire purpose of the “limited” search, aka “Terry Stop”), they can’t justify a search for finding it, nor demand that you produce it yourself. If the cop tries to BULLY you by saying “Sir, you can SHOW me what you’ve got on your own, or I’ll get a warrant, and it’ll be far ‘WORSE’ “, implying a THREAT, as your voluntary proffering of illegal contraband will only negate your 4A rights re: search and seizure. Don’t be buffaloed (of course, don’t HAVE anything “illegal”, but a wad of Dead Presidents is NOT “contraband”).
These are the risks that ANYONE that deals in large sums of cash runs. A fistful of dead “Founding Fookers” or “Dishonest Abe” on the “Five” is, de facto, a CRIME of itself, b/c your movements can’t be tracked and more readily TAXED, or proscribed altogether.
Doug,
This is the exact reason why you rent a baby. Everybody knows you put the cash in a plastic baggie and then in the baby’s diaper. The baby goes in a stroller (not through the TSA machine) and we all know cops don’t search babies. 😉
I’ll have to remember that hack next time I wanna bring back some seriously good “Ganja” from Jamaica, Mon.
While in general, I would agree with you, you seem to be assuming that the check you want to cash is valid. Granted, the check is made out to you, but it represents money from someone else’s account which may or may not have the funds to cover the check. By depositing the check, the bank gets to verify that the check is valid by processing the transaction so that the money can be deposited into your account (I’m assuming the check is from another bank – if from their own bank, you would think they could check that other person’s account, but still, the money has to be transferred to your account). So, while I understand your frustration, this just seems like reasonable business practice – that is, the bank just does not trust that every piece of paper handed to them is valid, but verifies that it is before handing out money.
Not sure if you were replying to me John, but if so, the bank/cashiers check we deposited ‘cleared’ the waiting period and the funds were deposited and avail. in our account. The buying bank ‘reached’ back in after this.
Still don’t know how this happened. It seems no one wants me to know.
I asked for $1000 in hundreds once. My bank made me feel like a criminal for asking and made a big embarrassing deal about it. Never went back to that branch.
very bad bank story:
We were given a certified/cashiers check for a private purchase. I still didn’t trust it, took it to my bank and the teller said ‘this is as good as cash’. Deposited it.
4-5 days later the buying bank reached back into my account and took/stole the money back.
We got our bank involved and it went all the way up to a VP.
I won’t share the specifics, but I was told by my bank that I could sue and win, and get the money back.
We chose to settle the issue instead as the cost to sue was more than we lost in the ‘fix’.
So my lesson is we can’t even trust certified/cashiers checks anymore if a bank can go in and ‘refund’ the money cause they made a huge mistake with bad actor. There is something rotten going on.
It’s gotten bad enough that it’s too risky to take a “Certified” check or money order, as they’ve been convincingly forged as well. It’s YOU that are on the hook for it. If, say, you’re selling a vehicle, do the transaction at YOUR bank, with the buyer bringing cash in hand. If you take a check, DO NOT relinquish title and the item until it CLEARS, period!
Eric,
A couple of stories from the 1980s.
I was a passenger at an NBD drive through on Telegraph. The driver had a stack of checks to deposit and dropped one as he was stamping the backs.
As I handed it back to him I noticed that the check was made out to him personally but the stamp said for deposit only with his corporate name.
He really schooled me on banking regulations that day. To the tune of two hundred bucks. I made a bet and gave him a check made out to Mickey Mouse. He stamped it and a few minutes later it went into the tube. A few days later my account had $200 less.
He also informed me that a bank has no legal obligation to honor a check drawn on an account from that bank.
A few months later I walked into the Grand River/Lahser branch of Detroit Bank & Trust with a check made out to me. The check number was eight thousand something, the account was opened in April of 1959 at that exact location, and the amount was $40. They told me sorry.
I made a huge scene and kept screaming about bank fraud and someone call the police as I was being “escorted” by security.
Since the 16th precinct was only three blocks away, it wasn’t long before I was cuffed and sitting in the back of a blue and white Plymouth Gran Fury. (An appropriate car as I was furious.)
Surprisingly the cops helped me get my money. They listened to my story, had the bank call the old woman who wrote the check. Police talked to her too and she was worried that I had been in an accident.
Two hours after I first entered the bank the cops pulled me out of their car, took off the bracelets, and handed me my license with two brand new twenty dollar bills. I didn’t get the usual fancy bank envelope that day.
The next time that old gal gave me a check the number was one hundred something and drawn on a different bank. I felt vindicated.
I had turned off her water to repair a shut off and hose bib. She was without water for about 4 hours. The bank was on the way to the hardware store. Less than three mile round trip.
Has banking improved in the last 40 years?
Small local banks are generally better than the nationals. However their ranks are thinning pretty quickly and the survivors often become too much like the big banks (or they get bought by one of the bigs). The local bank I once banked with was bought out, and then that bank got bought out by one of the bigs. So it went from a smallish bank with about a dozen branches to being part of BMO!
I ended up with a new startup small bank. Some of those employees from the bought out bank and some from another bought out bank decided to start up a new community bank. It actually turned out better as it is a much better bank. It remains to see how long that lasts though. It probably will get an offer it can’t refuse at some point.
Banks used to be checked by and competed against more by credit unions. Credit unions offered (at least around here) just about everything a bank could. And they were usually much cheaper too. Today it’s hard to tell the difference between banks and credit unions. The advantages of credit unions have dried up over the years it seems.
I keep almost no money in the bank. I get 10% interest on my Voyager crypto brokerage holding US dollar coin. Beat’s 0% in a savings account. All my money goes to stable coin crypto currency or other investments. Screw em.
Customer service is dead. They act as if you should be grateful you’re doing business with them. Insurance companies are the most impudent.
Speaking of white supremacy, my bank (a small one) recently bragged about being part of some national “diversity” organization. I guess that explains why they’ve been hiring so many inept hoodrats lately.
Tucker Carlson had a story of Bank of America voluntarily turning over your information to the FBI if you happened to be in DC around January 6th.
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/tucker-carlson-bank-of-america-customer-data-feds-capitol-riot
What most don’t think about in fractional reserve banking is money is expanded over 26 times it’s original value by; your deposit is loaned out with 10% retained as reserve to your deadbeat brother in law, which the loaned money becomes a deposit somewhere else with 10% reserved, and so on 26 times. Just think of the $2 trillion just printed out of thin air by the Fed Reserve (Not a Government Bank) and deposited 26 times.
I heard banking is controlling the buying and selling of power transfers from and to utilities? They will corrupt everything they touch.
Interesting about cyrpto currencies are gaining favor. I don’t trust them yet and Bitcoin is way over valued but it might be eventually an alternative to this corruption. This is until they become outlawed by the John Gill presidentcy.
‘your deposit is loaned out with 10% retained as reserve’ — Hans Gruber
Textbooks repeat the ancient prudential standard of 10% reserves to this day. But things have changed.
Reserve requirements started slipping away in 1994, with Greenspan’s clever criminal subterfuge of allowing fictitious ‘overnight sweeps’ from checking into reserve-free savings accounts.
But as of the pandemic onset in early 2020, required reserves ENDED:
‘As announced on March 15, 2020, the Board of Governors reduced reserve requirement ratios on net transaction accounts to 0 percent, effective March 26, 2020. This action eliminated reserve requirements for all depository institutions.’
https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h3/h3_technical_qa.htm
‘School’s out forever!’ so to speak.
Like the carefree children of summer, banksters have been liberated to pyramid to the sky … and beyond.
Who needs stinkin’ reserves, when unlimited thin-air currency can paper over any calamity that befalls a nationalized banking system?
Free money, free beer, free love … for the compliant. Got stimmys?
Even before the plandemic, the 10% thing was a myth; I think the idea was hatched and perpetuated by those who do not understand how fractional-reserve banking ‘works’. In reality, the banks can (and could) loan 10x the amount of money that they have on deposit.
Think about it: Most checking/savings accounts only contain an average balance of a few thousand dollars. If the banks could use 90% of that (i.e. if they had to back-up loans dollar-for-dollar) they wouldn’t have much money to loan…and the accounts that secure those loans would be in default of what they secure on a regular basis, as their holders write checks and withdraw money.
That 10% myth would actually be more legit than the actual way it is, where the total of the banks deposit need only amount to 10% of what they loan (i.e. they can loan $9 of non-existant money for every dollar in their bank).
Jim H.
Thanks for the info. I had no idea that another corrupt transition occurred via the fake pandemic and bankers got a final boost of zero reserve ratio.
The new coin of the realm is Covid. It provides every excuse to empower those to steal, and make their Marxist political desires a reality. In government it provides the excuse for all to not work, not perform, and get paid.
The deposit itself isnt loaned out. That deposit is kept at whatever fractionnal reserve is required to secure that loan and other loans as well. The other 90% of any loan is created out of thin air by the federal reserve. If banks could only lend out actual deposits the whole system would collapsE in 3 hours. Maybe 3 minutes.
Make it rain!
Exactly, Mark! The average total of deposits represents 10% of the money they can create purely on paper to loan out.
regarding crypto the fed cant make more bitcoin – yet. I’m sure NSA crptographers are working on it. It is a safe alternative investment in my view if indeed its uncrackable.
I like the analogy from Classic Star Trek’s episode, “Patterns of Force”…”outlawed by the John Gill presidency”. Question is: WHO is playing the role of Deputy Fuhrer Melakon?
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Patterns_of_Force_(episode)
‘They regard owners of accounts as pleaders they may deign to deal with, if the pleaders do as they are told.’ — EP
The supercilious contempt of the petty bureaucrat applies equally in another gov-sponsored sector, public schools.
In one of the better-heeled suburbs of a nearby metro area, the school district is laying off 150 employees due to falling enrollment. Too many of its customers just up and walked away.
Ever heard of value subtraction? In the former Soviet Union, many state-sponsored enterprises produced goods that were worth less than the value of their inputs (materials and labor).
Likewise, despite public schools being ‘free’ of any incremental costs, parents fleeing lockdowns apparently regard their ‘services’ — replete with social[ist] indoctrination — as being worth LESS THAN NOTHING, despite the enormous cost of their inputs (buildings, administrators, teacher salaries).
Wholesale abandonment of public schools is a cheerful note of hope in an otherwise bleak time. Let ten thousand truants bloom … ah HA HA HAAAHHHH!
“Wholesale abandonment of public schools is a cheerful note of hope in an otherwise bleak time.”
Which is why the ptb are doing anything possible to get kids back into the schools full time asap. Talking to administrators back in nov/dec it was “oh, could be 2 years or more before we are back in schoool full time.” Now its we want all kids back by 4th marking period and there will be no virtual option come september. I wonder what could have changed. Maybe stuff like my younger son blurting out in virtual class that earth day was established by a devoted communist on lenin’s birthday and similar comments i’ve heard from other kids in his online class that have prompted schools to realize parents can de-program their indoctrination in real time when kids spend more time at home. We even got an email asking parents to not listen in and interrupt kids lessons. That kids should be provided a room to work in by themselves. Yeah, no, i’m home i’m going to listen to the garbage you spew to my kids.
I have to admit that this is one of my favorite comments in quite a while.
I lived the first 39 years of my life without having any bank accounts. Got a checking account when I moved to the sticks, for ‘convenience’ (Banks here are a lot nicer than the bulletproofed big-corporate Orwellian ziggurats of NY!)- but I’m on the verge of closing my account. The lobby of my bank has been closed for almost a year (drive-up only); Then there was the time a few years back when I went in to get a cashier’s check to send to a friend from whom I was buying a vehicle, and they told me they couldn’t take my cash- that I’d have to deposit the money…yada yada…to which I made some choice expletives before exiting, having transacted no business….. And of course, whatever business you do with a bank, is on record for Uncle’s scrutiny.
We’ll be forced to do without many of these things soon anyway if we stay here….so might as well make the transition at our leisure, eh? The price of convenience is often too high…and becoming higher all of the time.
That shit will prompt the BARTER economy. Not as “efficient”, but a LOT harder for “Uncle” to monitor and CONTROL.
You are right about the “illegals” having a greater degree of freedom. What galls me the most is when I hear “American Patriots” complain about “them” and demand that the Messicans get screwed over just like them. They seem totally clueless and unaware of how “their” govt is jamming it up their ass and only demand others get the same treatment. Never do they rise on their hind legs and demand their God Given freedoms.
Banks are a one sided relationship. I have considered pulling all my cash out & keeping it elsewhere, using banks only for direct deposit & bill paying. But that would end up resulting in some sort of “drug activity” investigation probably.
We live in a fascist economy. Banks are one example. Totally intertwined with the govt and each other in a cabal designed to control peoples’ actions through fees & regulations.
The trick is never let your account get to that $10k threshold where you become a target of “inquiry”. I keep enough money in my account for on line purchases, and ordinary every day expenses, and bills automatically charged to my debit card. Which for me requires a balance of about $2k. If I need more than that, I simply deposit some cash.
The reasons why:
I long ago discovered, fortunately not by experience, that the IRS can lock down your account for the mere suspicion you may have filed incorrectly, whether you did or not, and the bank is pleased to accommodate them.
I canceled all my bills automatically directly withdrawn from my account when I discovered, once again not by experience, that if directly drawn from your account, you have to get permission from the party withdrawing to stop it. By having them attached instead to my debit card, I can cancel that card at any time. All I have to do is claim it lost or stolen and the bank will insist on doing so, since they are liable for false charges on it.
A real honest bank would not be such a problem. The problem with what passes for a bank now is that they are nothing less than an agent of the state. You are of secondary concern.
What you left out, John, is that the “State” is, in turn, the agent of the “Super” bank, aka the Federal Reserve Bank.