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And I'm Letting THEM Handle MY Money?? by Connie H. Deutsch Life is full of ironies. My bank is one of them. The other day I went into my bank to find out the procedure for depositing a three- party check and I was directed to the branch manager. I wasn't asked to have a seat at her desk so I stood there waiting for her to write down the information that I needed. She took a piece of paper and I watched her as she labored over each and every letter that went on that page. It took her several minutes to finish writing. I didn't have the time to read it so I thanked her for it and left. When I got home, I retrieved the piece of paper and my eyes felt like they were popping out of my head. I expected to see some pithy instructions, instead, there were only two words on this 3"x5" piece of paper; it said Endorsement Guarantee. The letters were so big that I was curious to see how much they measured. I took out my tape measure and wasn't surprised to see that each letter was a half-inch high and almost a half-inch wide, and each word took up a whole line and those two words took up the whole page. How could two simple words, one having eleven letters and the other one having nine letters, and both of them only three syllables, take such a long time to write? They weren't even particularly legible or pretty to look at. Between the branch manager's lack of good customer service skills (allowing a customer to stand and not asking her to have a seat while she wrote down those two words) and her inability to write legibly and quickly, I wondered how she could attain the position of branch manager of a bank. Then, in one of those timeless OH MY GAWD!! moments, I had the sudden disquieting thought, "And I'm letting HER handle MY money?? I don't know what the standards are nowadays for a person being given the position of branch manager of a bank but if this is an example of it, the banking industry is in even more trouble than we were led to believe. It makes me wonder if the people from bygone days didn't have the right idea of hiding their money under their mattress. The alternative to being robbed by burglars invading your home or being robbed by the banking industry or by employers dipping their fingers into pension funds seems too close to call. Probably the only real difference may be that you are physically at risk when thieves break into your house whereas only your money is at risk when the banking industry commits fraud or your employer steals the money from your pension fund. One of the most frustrating things is trying to get information from someone who should know the answer to your question and being told that it's their policy. I don't know about you, but that's not a good enough answer for me. I want to know why something can't be done, not that it can't be done because it's their policy. And that's how I ended up with the branch manager of my bank. I wanted to know why the signature of the third party, endorsing the check, wasn't enough to deposit the funds. After all, the bank accounts of all three signatories were on the check and the funds wouldn't be released for five days until the check cleared. She didn't even make a pretense of trying to answer my question; she just said that it was their policy and wrote those two words, Endorsement Guarantee, on that piece of paper and handed it to me. The person who can devise a way of bypassing banks and mattresses for storing money safely, without government interference and without worrying about becoming a target for theft, will become one of the wealthiest people on the planet. Where are the creative entrepreneurs who started the dot-com industry? Surely, one of them can come up with a workable solution to help the average person acquire money and protect his or her wealth. It shouldn't be that difficult for some enterprising person with vision to accomplish. Let the search for that creative person begin; it's never been more needed than now. Connie H. Deutsch is an internationally known business consultant and personal advisor who has a keen understanding of human nature and is a natural problem-solver. She is known throughout the world for helping clients find solutions to problems that are often complex and systemic in nature and part of a corporation's culture or an individual's pattern of behavior. Connie has hosted her own weekly radio show, been a weekly guest on a morning radio show, done guest spots on radio shows around the country, and appeared as a guest on a cable television show. Connie wrote a weekly newspaper Advice Column for sixteen years and has been invited to speak at local colleges and given lectures around the country. She also wrote the scripts for a weekly financial show on cable television. Connie is the author of the book, "Whispers of the Soul" and is the co-author of an E-book, "Getting Rich While the Rest of the World Falls Apart" which is being offered as a free download on her website. She has also written and produced two CDs on Meditation and Relationships and has done coaching on customer service and employee relationships. Her website is: http://www.conniehdeutsch.com
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money, bank, policy, signature, check, account, endorse, third party check, signatory, deposit, funds, pension, fraud, manager, banking industry, weal,
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