Ranty McRantPants

Also titled: Standard Bank, I hate you.

Urgh. This week should definitely already be over. I think The Trucker and I are both taking strain by trying to fit in everything we can and need to before our departure on Tuesday. I'm tired.

Okay, so that might be because we got our new Viscopedic mattress yesterday. Sleeping on a new mattress is harder than you realise. I dunno, I don't think I'm that fussy about these things, but it was something he really wanted. Let's hope the sleeping experience improves. We were also grumpy with each other by the time we went to sleep last night, so that never helps me sleep well either.

Also yesterday was a very long day. Another lovely morning, since I only came into the office at 10am. But that meant leaving at 6pm. And honestly, while I adored the early morning (although it's a little long for me, I am def not geared to do stuff around the house before work), the traffic was unbearable.

This happened last Wednesday, when I worked a later day as well. It blows my mind, how do other people do this every day. I know, they all ask how do I wake up at 5:20am every day. But to me, spending 25-30 minutes each way in traffic a day is absolutely, without question, all that I can justify. If you wait till "after traffic" (which, let's face it, in Joburg, never ever happens), you are so much more likely to hit insane traffic because someone else on the road has botched it for you with some accident or broken down something or another.

I thought maybe the highway standstill last week was a random, again I left the house at 9am to be at work by 10am. Both times I had to change up my route (ordinarily the highway), because of traffic. I have never understood going the "back-roads" route ... they are just as bad. It honestly makes the distance feel infinitely further to me.

Okay, so I've just checked Google. My usual route is 26.1km. and the back roads are 19km. But honestly, even if I took that route with no traffic it'd take far longer. Madness. Again, simply madness that I live so far from where I work. Which leads off onto some whole existential thing about how did society get here blah blah blah. See, that's what mood my mind is in today. Woe is me.

Then there was the *most* upsetting, makes me want to spit fire I'm so angry thing that happened this week. And Standard Bank is to blame. I am so annoyed with them right now o_0. I reckon I've already blown anything I'm getting back from the Tax Man, thanks to them. So with a rental property you have to show all this stuff for whatever reason (I don't know, my Tax Lady asks for it and I give it to her). But because the dumb banks can only give you 180 days or x number of transaction history on your account, when you leave it till this late date, you simply don't have the information at your finger tips.

And so, I called FNB and Standard Bank. FNB I have no problem with, I have my banking statements from them, via email. Which I can easily open, what a pleasure. The only thing was I couldn't find my bond statement, which comes less frequently for the period I needed. A quick call and literally maybe an hour later it arrived in my inbox, with no fuss and no mention of charge (I have yet to check my statement so for now am assuming there was no fee).

I also get my Standard Bank statements via email (I'm green like that). But they require you to download some dumb reader and you have to enter your card number (NOTE: NOT your account number, because Standard Bank made the stupidest user experience error ever when they designed their entire system) and a password. Usually, I'd say this is probably not a problem. Unless, like me, you no longer have the card from that period because one of their ATMs swallowed it. Nope, apparently their call center also can't tell you what your old card number was either? (To be honest, I didn't try the new card number, but I can't imagine it would work since it didn't exist when they emailed me the statements)

So they tell you it's R20 a page. Well, I think, when I get my 90 day statement printed at the atm (you know, for all those people who need it for something?), it's about 5 pages. And I want one for 7 months, so maybe 10 - 15 pages. It's a lot, but I need it for my tax, so it seems like a worthwhile investment. Sure I say, not a problem.

On Tuesday I received it in my inbox (3-5 working days later). It came in at a whopping 48 pages. How can that be. Well it's because they waste almost the entire page on rubbish. And I don't know what they think I need all the extra info for since it says very clearly "Copy Statement" all over the watermark so you couldn't actually probably use it for anything (? no idea what you'd be using it for anyway). I counted. The most transactions that any single page had was 8. EIGHT. 8? What on earth are they thinking. This is about the worst customer service experience I've ever had. (UPDATE: On the plus side, they do only seem to have charged R400 for the statements ... so perhaps they calculate the pages before they pad it with all the rubbish around the transactions? Or perhaps they have some kind of maximum charge. Either way it has made me feel marginally better).

So, yes, I'm considering going back to getting my Standard Bank statements via post again. But I hated that too because for some unknown reason they can't freaking manage to collate the pages before folding. So you get 3 (or so) individually folded pages. Grr. Besides, I'd probably just throw those in the bin anyway, who has space for all that paper o_0. Why can't the Tax Man just get all this information himself anyway??

So I'm in a swell mood this morning. Yup. Damn, I need this holiday.

Fuck you @StandardBankGrp I ask for a historical statement at R20 a page & you manage to fit a whopping 8 transactions on each page ?! Wtf.
— phillygirl (@philly_girl) September 10, 2013