Bank On It

As on-site viewers of the great Depression, my grandparents nurtured an incredible distrust in banks. Even years later, they always seemed to be waiting for the next inevitable crash when their life savings would topple down like a Jenga game. Even though she was not making a deposit, my grandmother would go down to the County Trust branch on First Street in Mount Vernon every week and get her passbook updated with interest. If she didn't see it for herself in print, she would probably expect that week's added interest of $2.36 to disappear from the ledgers.

I've been a little luckier. I also can live quite comfortably in a world where there are no savings books. I can be quite contented working my banking accounts on-line. Of course, when I relocated to Los Angeles ten years ago, I was forced to find myself a new financial institute after a longterm marriage with Chase. The first few attempts at trying to find a new monetary dating partner were disastrous. I bounced my money around from bank to bank as if I were some prostitute looking for candy bars and nylons during World War II. Wells Fargo was the worst. They haphazardly would apply some stringent bank fee for any minor infraction. I sneezed once on a teller's line and the bank manager ran over immediately. "That will be three dollars, sir. And gesundheit." It was that bad.

When I hooked up with Washington Mutual a few years ago, they were the new kids in town. My only reason for moving to them was they had a branch downstairs from my office. From my first inklings, they seemed to be super nice. And the fact that they were also opening up branches in New York made this bi-coaster a happy camper.

But, it was when push came to shove off the bridge that I married them for life. There have been two occasions where they bailed me out of my own overflowing bucket of stupidity.

A few years ago, I enjoyed lunch at PF Changs in Sherman Oaks with a friend of mine. I picked up the tab. The following day, I hopped onto an American Airlines flight for seven days in NY. As per usual upon my arrival, I head to the supermarket for some apartment essentials. I opened my wallet to run my bank card. It was not there. It didn't take me long to figure out that I had left it the day before at PF Changs.

And the call to the restaurant confirmed it. My debit card was sitting safely in some manager's drawer, like a lost boy sucking on a lollipop at the police station. The only trouble is that they would not release it to my friend. Or mail it to me in NY. Screwed. For the next seven days.

I called Washington Mutual and they bent over backwards to get a new debit card expressed to me in two days. And they didn't blink an eye. Never once did they challenge me for my stupidity. I was doing that all by myself.

If that was my engagement with this bank, here's how the formal wedding happened. Just last week. On Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving.

No, I was not at a doorbusters sale at Kohl's. I had gone to the WaMu ATM near my house to get some cash to pay my housekeeper, who has suddenly figured out she can take our checks anymore. Don't ask. Anyway, I then head to a local card store. I open my wallet to pay. The debit card is gone. Of course, I had left it in the ATM slot.

Cursing my burgeoning career as a numbskull, I raced back to the bank. The card was gone from the slot. I immediately assumed that I was the Christmas miracle for some Mexican family. But, no. My debit card was safe and sound in the ATM vault. WaMu has a safety feature. Cards not retrieved are sucked back into the machine, which is something that your favorite blogging moron never knew.

Now I'm sure other banks have similar devices in place. But they're not Washington Mutual. The girl gave me back my card with a smile.

And my account wasn't charged three dollars.

Dinner last night: Crispy Spicy Beef at the Cheesecake Factory.