Fashionably Fiscally Solvent

...and took my husband out to dinner last night.

Yes, that's right. The week of Thanksgiving, I was furloughed for one day, reducing my bi-weekly pay by 10%. This is, of course, not the first time this year that this has happened to me, but unlike the first two furlough pay periods, I didn't end up in dire financial straights.

Rewind back to May 2009. Rumors of our impending furlough days have been circulating throughout the offices at the state, but the judiciary workers such as myself are buoyed by our union's self-confidence. "Oh, the Governor can furlough executive branch employees, but we're a separate branch. He can't change our contract."

Even into the week before the furloughs, our union remained stupidly optimistic as it went into negotiations for our contract. The day before the first furlough, they announced that the furlough would be going forward after all, "but we're still in negotiations, so don't worry, you'll get your annual raises in July, and that'll make up for the furlough day!"

So I dipped into savings, wiping it out to make up for the 10% I was down in pay that week and to buy plane tickets for David and I to see my in-laws at Christmas, figuring that the worst was past and there'd be no problem flying to England for a couple of weeks six months into the future.

Then, in June, our union dropped the other shoe -- we were taking a furlough day in June. And November. And we weren't getting our raises. I was unable to to recoup my savings account losses and began balancing the June budget with more and more borrowing, juggling money from one account to another, hoping I could keep my shit together long enough to make it into October, when there'd be a third pay period to make up the shortfall.

Somewhere around September, with no savings because I was still juggling my bills to make up for June and the lack of a raise, I dropped the ball. Like dominoes, my banks began overdrafting as a failure to draft from one bank triggered a bill to try to draft from another one.

By November, I had overdrawn and closed one account by $258.00, overdrawn a second account by $70 (that I was able to recoup with a five minute phone call), and $125.00 in my third account. That third pay period in October helped me bring all of my accounts back to zero, but I still felt horrible that I'd let myself get into such a mess in the first place, so I scrapped all of my budgets and financial tools and headed back to the drawing board.

Today, my accounts are set up as follows:

1. ING Electric Orange Gas Hedge Fund draws $40 bi-weekly from my check to cover gas expenses only. Whatever I don't spend stays in the account, hedging against future fuel cost increases.
2. ING Savings sub-accounts set up to draw from my check bi-weekly for an emergency fund (10%), my phone bill, my insurance payments, and my utilities. Because my utilities fluctuate based on usage, I took last year's bill and came up with a monthly average (total spent divided by twelve), then divided that by two and pull that bi-weekly. Like the fuel hedge fund, the excess I save up during low-usage months will hedge against the months when I've got the furnace cranking or the air conditioner up at 11.
3. Credit Union: because I can only split my bank accounts between one checking account and a credit union account, I set up a credit union account to hold my car payment and share of the rent. This comes out of my paycheck automatically -- I never even see it, unlike the ING account, where the money hits my account Thursday night and leaves on Friday, thus existing in my account for a full 24 hours -- so I'm not tempted to spend it.
4. Chase checking is my spending money -- my debt payments like credit card and loan payments (which I always try to pay more than the minimum on) and the groceries. After all the bills have come out, I can figure out from my budget how much extra to pay on my debts and how much I can spend for myself.

By the time I saw my reduced pay check for this pay period, the rent and car payment were already out of the account, and within twenty four hours, so were the most important bills and the savings account money. Now, I needed to look at the irregular bills and debt payments and squeeze 10% back out.

One thing I regularly spend about 10% of my pay on is groceries, and so once I identified my biggest irregular expense, I decided to attack it head on. I pulled out everything sitting in the fridge, freezer, and pantry, and I cataloged the items and amounts. Then, I went through my small library of cookbooks, looking for recipes that would use up most of those ingredients and discovered (amazingly) that I had almost an entire weeks' worth of meals already in the house; all I needed were some fresh vegetables, meat, and spices and voila! A week's worth of meals for $45.00!

I looked at my finances again. With the grocery bill more than cut in half, if I skipped the extra credit card payment this month and only made the minimum payment, I'd recover that 10% pay I'd lost. In fact, once all my money was in its place, I discovered I'd even recovered my bi-weekly spending allowance, which my husband and I decided to spend on a dinner at a chain restaurant. No, it's not our usual long, dinners over bottles of wine at local restaurants, but it felt like a really nice treat at the end of a tough week, and was especially rewarding because I could cut expenses rather than cutting back on, or dipping into, savings.

Sure, some financial bloggers might look down on that meal out -- those of the Dave Ramsey school of thinking are probably yelling at their monitors his mantra, "When in debt, you shouldn't see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there!" but getting my net worth back into the black isn't about deprivation -- much like dieting, starving yourself and denying the things you love is only going to lead to cheating. Everything should be in moderation, and with my bills paid, waiting for two weeks before spending a dime on myself was what would keep me on my track to fiscal solvency.  

Recently, my lunchtime yoga instructor and I were talking before class about how completely stressed out I often look when I walk in the room, and I explained that part of it was due to my daily commute: 27.5 miles each way on a two-lane, no passing "highway" peppered with red lights and congested with semis and farm equipment. Having previously done the same commute, the yogi suggested I begin doing mantras on my way to and from work every morning, starting with "So hum"-- I am that. ("That" being in the sense of "I am that am", not looking at objects and going "I am that...tree. I am that...cloud. I am that...asshole driver that just pulled out in front of me and slammed on his breaks because he's on his cellphone, arg! What's your fucking problem? Die die DIE!")

So, at 4:30 yesterday afternoon, I pulled out of the parking lot at my office and began focusing on my breath, in and out, in and out. I put on some soft music (which, for a rocker like me, is "No Surprises" by Radiohead, "Pretty Mary K" by Elliot Smith, and Fiona Apple's cover of "Across the Universe", among others) and began my trek home.

Somewhere around Hopewell, though, with my mind cleared, the mantra faded, and I was brought quickly back to reality by the dinging of the MINI's low-gas warning.

Aw, fuck.

After pulling into a gas station and forking over my debit card for a full tank, I sank back into my seat, music still playing, and began thinking about the cost of this tank of gas, and as I tried to reclaim my breath and refocus my mind, I got lost in how much I spend every week on gas. My manual transmission, 2007 MINI Cooper gets about 38.7 miles to the gallon (according to the in-dash computer) and the average gas price is currently $2.49 per gallon. I whipped out my calculator and did the math based on my weekly commute, miles per gallon, and average cost of a gallon, and realized I spend around $17.69 per week on gas just to get to and from work (ignoring any other time I use the car, such as grocery shopping, running errands at home or doing my lunch break, etc.)

Then, I began thinking of the other expenses of being an office drone.

At least once a month, there's a party to celebrate someone's birthday, which costs an average of $10 per month. Since there are approximately 4.3 weeks in a month, this costs me $2.33 per week.

Additionally, at least once a week someone wants to eat lunch together as a group. Since this is usually really hard for me to decline, I end up forking over about $6.00 a week for one lunch with the girls.

There's also that yoga class, which some girls in the office put together with a local gym that just opened up. They gave us a group discount so that I pay $12.50 per week for a lunch time yoga class every Wednesday.

Finally, about once a week, there's the lottery collection that the girls put together in the office. In fact, just that morning, I forked over a dollar in quarters to get in on the wager.

Add it all up, and there it is: $39.52 per week spent because of my office. That doesn't even factor in maintenance on the car, the clothes, the lunches I brown bag, and the other little assorted costs associated with working in an office. That's just the cash that goes directly out of my pocket every week because of the expenses of being a part of that office. And I didn't even realize it, because it's a few bucks here and there, but when you tally up one week, DAMN that's a lot. It's $2,055.56 per year, or 5% of my take-home pay, which doesn't seem like a lot, but when I just lost 10% of my take home pay this week due to a furlough day, 5% of my pay isn't something I can afford to lose.  

Seven years ago, when I completely ruined my credit, there wasn't a credit card company that would talk to me, unless of course, they were a complete scam. I'd often get "pre-approved" offers to "rebuild your credit!" with terms such as $150 annual fee, $100 account activation fee, and a $6/month account maintenance fee. Since the cards usually came with a $300 credit limit, that would put me $256 in debt before I ever received the card.

Naturally, I responded to these "limited-time offers" for cards sponsored by the American Quarter Horse Association (among others) thus:

Eventually, I received an offer that actually wasn't so terrible. It was my 25th birthday and I couldn't believe it when I received an application in the mail that only charged $69.00 a year for a fee and didn't make me pay to pull my credit report, activate and maintain my account, or simply breathe. The catch, of course, was that it would still be a $300 limit -- and a 19.9% APR, but it was actually financed through a bank -- HSBC -- that I'd heard of, so I decided to try the online, "preapproved" application form. You know, for giggles.

Wouldn't you know it, I was approved.

A month -- and several worried phone calls later -- I had that card in my hot little hands, and immediately threw it into a drawer. When the first bill came, I paid off the annual fee and tried to forget about that little card.

Eventually, I received another $300, $49.00/year card from HSBC when I took out an auto-loan with them, at which point the first card's limit was around $500 -- then another $300, $49.00/year card after that. Of course, the great HSBC Fuck-Up of 2009 wiped out that first "training wheels" card, as I liked to call it, but with a few more limit increases, as of November 2009, I had $900 available in credit and was feeling pretty good about the situation, even if my cards had an average APR of 18.7%.

Then, I got bold.

I was buying Christmas presents online over Black Friday weekend, stacking discounts and coupons like a mad woman. I'd already heavily discounted a few presents on Amazon when I noticed I could take off an additional $30 if I opened a Chase credit card account with them. The account would reward me with points for my purchases, and I'd get the $30 savings on my Christmas presents.

I was doubtful about the idea -- would they extend me credit? Would it be enough to cover my shopping -- but hit "Apply" anyway.

Instantly, I was approved.

Approved for a line of credit in the amount of $1,500.

Holy shit, I'm a big kid now! The training wheels are off, folks!

My co-workers and I all share a similar background of stupid financial mistakes and digging out of the Credit Score of Doom, so I was very excited to report my "First Big Girl Credit Card", and they actually (for once) seemed impressed by my credit rehabing ability. It was only a week later, when the card and it's terms and conditions sheets arrived in the mail, that I noticed the details.

APR on my big girl card? 21.9%

"Holy fucking shit!" I said to myself. "I'd better pay this thing off and ditch it."

After a calming cuppa, I checked out the rest of the terms and conditions. There were some great perks that came with the card, perks that your credit rehabing "Training Wheels" cards don't come with, like rental car insurance, purchase protection, and purchase warranties. There was also the lack of an annual fee, which definitely caught my eye.

"Hmm," I wondered, "Will the lack of annual fee make this card better than my other two?"

I decided to find out.

I whipped out my handy-dandy graphing calculator (yes, you know, that monster thing you had to buy in college for pre-calc and never used again? I still carry mine around, because I'm a nerd.) and ran some calculations, based on my total shopping bill for Christmas ($480.70) and my usual monthly payment (about $50 a month).

With a balance of $480.70 and a minimum payment of $50/month:

Chase would be paid off in 11 months and cost me $52.41 in interest.

HSBC would be paid off in 11 months and cost me $43.93 in interest. However, when you add in the annual fee of $49.95, my cost is $93.88.

Then, my super nerdy inner math geek kicked in and wondered "Hmm, is there ANY interest rate where a $50/year annual fee would beat a ridiculous interest rate like that? Rather than do some fancy math for that, however, I just decided to see what would happen by reducing the interest to 1% APR.

With a theoretical credit card with 1% APR, the card would be paid off in 10 months and cost me $2.12 in interest. Add in the annual fee, however, and my savings would be 35 cents.

And if I had one of those magical 0% APR for 12 months cards that were so popular two years ago -- with that annual fee? I'd still pay the debt off in 10 months and save $2.46.

Now, for the uber-frugal, that probably sounds like a good deal. Over ten years, I'd save $24.60! But saving $2.46 a year isn't a big win for me. Hell, that isn't even a latte. Besides, no matter what the interest rate is, there will always be the annual fee, even if you don't use the card. APR is completely moot if you're starting off at a deficit with the card.

Now, because I know about credit utilization and account ages as determinants for credit score, I'm not going to close those HSBC accounts quite yet. But, as soon as I bring that Chase card down to zero and have held onto it for a year, you're damned well sure that I'm going to think about it.

In case you couldn't tell based on the numbers above, yes, last year when I applied for a job in financial planning, I pulled my credit report and score to find out exactly how bad the situation was, and that was the result. As of October 20, 2008 my credit score was an abysmal 580.

Now, since the credit score range is 300 to 850, 580 might not seem too bad, and in reality, it wasn't the worst I'd ever had it. Around the time my debt total was $50,000 and I was being sued by two different debt collection attorneys, my credit score was probably very close to 300; I don't know exactly, as I was too terrified to even look at my credit report. And while a score of 580 didn't stop me from getting a car loan or a credit card, it did cause me to have the worst possible terms and interest rate offered -- 19.99% on a $300 limit card and 15.9% on my car loan in 2007.

Ouch.

After the company that had offered me a job as a financial planner pulled my credit report, they told me I could still come and work for them as soon as I had settlements - in writing - from all of my long-overdue creditors (about 4 at the time) who were still looking for payment. I hadn't looked at my credit report in years -- and was always too terrified to pay for my score -- so I felt a little nauseous logging on to Annual Credit Report.com and putting in my details.

But I was glad I did.

Within about ten minutes, I could see exactly what my new employer was seeing, and my nervousness and anxiety turned into anger. There were errors on my credit report! A judgment against me that should have rolled off my report as it was over 7 years ago and paid in full was still showing as active and uncollected! An account I settled with Capital One in 2004 still showed as not only outstanding, but active and not charged-off! And then there were the two accounts I'd completely forgotten about -- a Sprint cellphone bill from 2001 and a Sears charge card from 2000!

Feeling angry and now curious, went to myFICO and signed up for a free 30 day trial of their credit score monitoring, which gave me my credit score for free. It wasn't pretty: 580!

So, what did I do to bring my score up by 60 points one year later? And what can you do to "rehab" your credit report?

1. Go to Annual Credit Report.com (Do NOT use "freecreditreport.com" as that requires enrollment in a credit monitoring program that costs $15/month to get your "free" credit reports) and check your credit reports for errors.
2. If you find an error, report it to each credit reporting agency it appears on. Do not assume that if you report it to one, it will be removed on all three. It doesn't work like that. If it shows up on TransUnion and Equifax, but not Experion, you need to report to both TU and Eq about the error to have it fixed.
3. If you see something you forgot about but know you own, don't try to be slick and report that as an error as well. Instead, get the contact info and call up the debt collector or bank that you owe. Explain you forgot about them, that you don't have the money to pay the balance in full, but you can pay off the principle as a settlement. Most will be so surprised to hear you calling them to make an offer, they won't refuse. Make sure you get the terms of the settlement IN WRITING, including the fact that they'll update your credit report information as "Paid In Full, Closed by Account Holder". Do not pay a dime until you have that agreement in your hand, even if it's just a faxed or emailed (pdf) version of the agreement. Then, insist on cutting them a check. Do NOT do an electronic check -- never give a creditor bank or debt collection company your bank account number or routing number unless you want to see more than your agreed upon amount fly out of the account.
4. 30 days after the dispute, the credit reporting agencies will tell you whether or not the bank has provided them with proof of the account. Sometimes, banks lie. Capital One had charged off my card in 2001, I paid the debt collection agency in 2004, and my account should have rolled off in 2008. It DEFINITELY shouldn't have been open, active, and charging -- but it was. It's what some people call "zombie debt" -- the account should be dead and gone, but it's been reanimated! Just gather your evidence and call the bank. If that doesn't work, it's time to fire off letters to the FTC, consumer reporting agencies, your local investigative news team, and The Consumerist website. It's also time to Executive Email Carpet Bomb the suckers -- go to the website and find out who the executives of the company are. Gather all email addresses, then email every one of them about how much their company is screwing you. Outline whom you've notified of your zombie debt. List all steps taken to rectify the situation. Trust me, you'll have their attention.
5. Other times, the account can't be verified because your account has been sold off so many times, no one knows who owns what. This was especially true of my other error on the report. It was two months of rent that I was sued for in 2001. I realized I'd never finished the payment plan, so I tried to call to have them credit the account for what I did pay immediately after the judgment and find out who I needed to pay. Well, the property had been sold to an investment company, which meant that there were many owners of my debt. The owners who were responsible for collecting on it then went bankrupt and were split into two different companies. I emailed all of them, asking them all for help. No one believed they owned my debt and referred me to another company. Before I finished with each call, I asked them to report to the Credit Reporting Bureaus that the debt was no longer theirs. After about three months, the debt was off my report.
6. As for credit limit increases. I called my "baby" or "training wheels card" as I like to call it, and asked for a limit increase and ended up with a $600 limit and a second card for being an excellent customer. This card also had an initial limit of $300, but it was a lower interest rate of 12.9%. Now, my debt utilization was much lower -- I went from $100 on a $300 card (or 33% utilization) to $100 on a $600 card with a 0 balance on another $300 card. Since debt management/utilization is a major factor in your credit score, making up 35% of it, this was very important.
7. Finally, and most boringly, I made more than the minimum payment on all my debts -- including student loans and my car loan -- every month starting that month. Even if it was just rounding up to the next ten dollars, I paid a little more here and there, getting down my debt while building a good credit history.

Since I received my first "baby" card in 2006, I now have three solid years of on time, over the minimum payments and my total debt is $30,400, which includes $15,000 in student loans and a $14,000 car loan. Oh, and $400 in credit card debt. All are current, active, positive accounts. My last negative account -- a student loan I failed to pay on for 6 months before I rolled it into a new student loan to finish my degree -- will roll off next year. Then we'll see the final jump in my credit score!

In Wednesday's post, I talked about my $4,600 cheap elopement, part of which was the $1,100 photographer.

Now, there might be some question as to why David and I chose to spend a third of our budget (and a quarter of our final total) on a professional photographer, especially when our cheapo $225 wedding chapel package came with flowers, music, video (the DVD was $20 more), and a photographer. The answer is two-fold.

First, photographs are the one thing that lasts after an event, after your better days have been placed behind you in the faded, dim fog of memory. Author Chuck Palahniuk once wrote about volunteering in a hospital working with Alzheimer's patients, how toward the end, all of their possessions gone to greedy relatives or estate sales to pay the exponentially-mounting costs, all that was left for so many patients was a box of photographs--an entire life reduced to photographs in a beat up box.

Second, and more importantly, I'm a professional photographer, and for even an untrained eye, there's a huge difference between these two photos of the same moment in time:

Free Chapel Photographer

Professional Photograph

The more I looked, the more I was bothered by the bad composition, the bad post-production, the just general BADNESS! In about thirty seconds, I had the photo downloaded; in photoshop; cropped so that the knees, crotch, and ceilling were gone; and back up online, which improved the photo by 100%. Seriously, that all it took -- seeing the photo, knowing what was wrong, and loading photoshop.

If I'd had the raw files, I could have done more -- mostly because I invested in my career. I've spent money going to classes on photoshop, took classes in photography, took time in a crappy studio job to learn lighting and composition when I could have been working on a big-fee job.

What I'm saying can best be summed up by what your mom probably told you in the past: you get what you pay for.

This isn't to say that free is always bad -- a skilled photographer giving away a free portrait session is excellent, but sitting for a free portrait session that's going to look like you put a camera on a tripod and hit "self-timer" mode? That's time you could have been using for something productive, something fun, something that wasn't a complete waste of time. I know there's this strange logic out there that if it's free, you shouldn't knock it, but guess what?

You win a free photo session. You sit down with a crap photographer. You get the crap photos back. No loss, right?

Except, in the time between making the appointment and getting the photos back, you've psychologically prepped yourself for a photo of your family to hang with pride on your wall, in your cubical, or at least on your Facebook page. And now your photo makes you look like you have 9 chins and suffer from extreme constipation.

Are you going to post that, or are you going to call someone else to do another sitting because you've psyched yourself up for something you don't have?

A quality photographer is easy to spot, just like a quality baker (as opposed to a Cake Wrecker) or a quality jeweler -- look at what they're putting out as a portfolio. Anyone worth booking is going to have a website, and if the website looks like it's from 1996, if the photos look like snapshots, then you don't want to use this vendor, even if they try to pay you money to use their services. It will waste time you could have used on some more entertaining or productive. Your time has a worth, and a free service that makes you want your money back has definitely had a negative effect on your time, your money, and your sanity.

It's like all those free samples you could sign up for -- yes, you could sign up for those free Depends, but um, why would you want to?

First of all, hello to any new readers following the link from Ramit Sethi's tweet today. I'm actually kinda embarrassed that one of my more rambling posts (about my depression, no less!) was tweeted by a financial blogger -- especially after a particularly bad bout of depression caused this blog to languish, unattended and unloved, for six months.

Now, when writing yesterday's post about making $70 in 5 minutes by simply asking for it, I kicked around the idea of including one of my losses into the post, where I didn't succeed in getting money by asking, following scripts, or doing anything of the things you're supposed to do. In fact, immediately after my success yesterday, feeling a bit on the bold side, I decided to call another bank that I'd overdrafted on the same day -- the bank I'd canceled the direct deposit on.

Last year, around this time, I switched jobs, moved to a new apartment, and switched to a new bank, but never bothered to close the old account. I simply filled out my direct deposit forms for the new account and waited for HR to do the rest.

And waited.

And waited.

After a few months, I realized that the direct deposit never had, in fact, switched over. I called HR to ask about the direct deposit, and they stated they'd never received it, and told me to send a new form, which I did. Soon after, my employer switched to online pay stubs, so I didn't know my direct deposit to my old account stopped on October 29th. When a pay stub-size envelope showed up on my desk on October 30th, I just assumed it was some tax form or notice about health care coverage and chucked it to the side. I was planning a party and had other things to attend to.

It was only on Monday, when Mint alerted me to the fact that my money hadn't pulled from my account at Sovereign to my newer Chase account that I realized I should probably open that "pay stub".

Oh, look at that! It's a live check!

I quickly deposited it into my Chase account to cover my bills that I'd already converted to that account and ran around online, trying to quickly convert all of my automatic payments from one account to another, but unfortunately, two bills that were due on the 5th of the month had already pulled  from Sovereign and two others pulled from Chase.

Yesterday, my first call was to Chase, my current bank, and without issue, they refunded my fees, as you saw.

Sovereign was an entirely different story.

My call started with a customer service rep (CSR) who didn't give me her name. Feeling more self-confident after my Chase Bank win, I decided to be firm and read straight from the script. (Take the going through an annoying touch-tone menu, giving my bank number and name multiple times, and being ID'd as read.)

ME: "Hi, I just noticed on my statement that I have two insufficient fund fees on my account, and I would like to have those waived."

CSR: "Let me look into that for you..."

A few seconds later.

CSR: "I'm sorry, but I'm unable to do that for you today. We offer over draft protection, which I could sign you up for today, so that next time you go over your limit--"

ME: "I won't go over my limit again. It was a mistake; it won't happen again."

CSR: "I'm sorry, but I'm unable to do that for you today. If you would like, I could set you up with overdraft protection--"

ME: "If you are unable to waive the fee, can you transfer me to someone who can?"

CSR: "One moment please."

Now, I think I'm starting to get somewhere. Between the hold time and having to verify my information twice, this call is already longer than the Chase call, but it's going to be worth it, right?

YVONNE: "Sovereign Bank, Yvonne speaking--"

ME: "Yes, I'd like to see about having two fees on my account waived--"

YVONNE: "I'm sorry, I can't do that for you. You'd have to speak to the branch manager of the branch where you opened your account."

ME: "I didn't open my account at a branch, I opened it online."

YVONNE: "Even accounts opened online are maintained at a branch. Let me look and see what your local branch is."

Long, pregnant silence.

YVONNE: "Your branch is in Burlington."

ME: "That's not even remotely close to where I live."

YVONNE: "I'm sorry, but only the branch manager can waive your fees. I can give you the phone number--"

ME: "Look, Yvonne, I'm feeling frustrated here. I've been a bank member for three years and I've always been a good customer. However, I do not feel like I'm being valued like a good customer. I've already been transferred once, supposedly to someone who could help me, and now I'm being told to go to a branch that's no where near where I live, because I opened an account online, to have these fees waived. Is that correct?"

YVONNE: "I can give you the phone number to the branch."

ME: "What department was I transferred to?" (I don't know why I went this long without asking this simple question.)

YVONNE: "I'm in customer retention."

Now, I worked for a bank when I was doing study abroad in England. I know that customer retention is where CSRs send customers who are about to close their accounts, where sales people are in the position to make sweet, honeypot deals to keep customers who are valuable to the company. I'm not being offered even a tiny deal, so I decide to make it really easy for her.

ME: "Well, I'd hate to leave this bank after three years if I cannot have my fee waived today--"

YVONNE: "You'd still have to call the branch manager."

That was pretty much it. I thanked her and promptly asked to have the account closed. She gave me the figure owed after the account closure (the account was still overdrawn when I called to reverse the fees) and told me to contact the branch manager to pay that amount off. Then the call was terminated.

A twenty minute call yielded me nothing. A five minute call before that yielded $70.

What gives?

Incentives. Look at the different situations between this call and the Chase. One bank had a current direct deposit. One did not. One bank had a positive balance. One was overdrawn. It's as simple as that. With Chase, I was a customer for one year who'd just switched my direct deposit to their bank and who was just adding money bank to an account that had several hundred dollars in it. That seems like a no-brainer: you want to keep a customer who is making you money, and the fact that I'm keeping a good amount of money -- and will be adding to that every two weeks -- denotes me as a customer worth keeping.

Sovereign, on the other hand, had no incentive to keep me -- for all they were concerned, I was a deadbeat who cost them money daily by virtue of the fact that I wasn't keeping money in their bank. I'd stopped the direct deposit, I'd stopped my direct debits, I'd essentially pulled out of that bank all together and now I was asking them for a favor?

"That girl's really gotta pair on her!" the CSRs might have said. (Or not. Most likely, they hung up and answered another call immediately without giving me another thought.) "Asking for money for nothing!"

So, today, I took my lunch break to drive to the branch where my account was assigned and paid off the balance, those closing the account. At first, I was bitter. "I'll tell that Sovereign Bank how much they suck, and they'll just beg me to keep the account open!" I told myself, but it didn't go down that way at all. I handed over cash, they handed me a receipt and proof that the account was closed. They didn't even bat an eye -- and why should they? All I did was cost them money, and at the end of the day, the bank isn't there to be your friend, to listen while you whine about how you didn't realize you were overdrafting, and to give you a break (regardless of what certain lobbiests and politicians think). A bank exists to make money; if you're costing them money, they don't owe anything to you.

Lesson to be learned: if you want to make $70 in 5 minutes, be a good customer and the bank will be good back. 

Let's start at the beginning here: I'm a non-confrontational person. Yes, I know, I know, "You've got to negotiate..." blah blah blah. "If you are firm and state what you need someone to do for you..." yadda yadda yadda. I've heard it for years. Unfortunately, gems like "Just call and negotiate your way to a lower rate," have one serious problem -- they don't take into account personality quirks that create massive barriers to saving money.

First, and this is a confession here, I suffer from Treatment-Resistant Unipolar Depression. That means that even with medication, even with therapy, I still have days when it's a struggle to get out of bed and just do the things that most people do without thinking. The easiest way to explain this for someone who's never suffered from mental illness, I'll refer to what's called The Spoon Theory. Imagine that every one of us has a finite amount of spoonfuls of energy -- for simplicity's sake, let's say we all get ten spoons. For people who do not have any sort of major mental illness, getting out of bed, brushing teeth, getting dressed, gathering tools for the day, and getting out the door probably takes one spoonful of energy; for someone like me, on bad days, it's one spoon just to get my ass out of bed. That means by the time lunch rolls around, I'm probably down to two or three spoonfuls -- enough to microwave my lunch, finish work, and drive home where I'll collapse into bed and hope my husband doesn't mind making dinner, washing up, and otherwise dealing with my corpse-like presence.

Naturally, on such days, the mental energy required to argue over the phone about getting $35 back for a late fee is just too freakin' much.

Even when I have the energy, there's the Rejection Problem that plagues a lot of people with Depression -- the fear of rejection becomes so palpable that it freezes one in place, leading to social awkwardness. If you've ever gone out to a bar, saw a really attractive person you wanted to hook up with, and went through the palms sweating, heart pounding, short of breath feeling that can accompany the approach as you're about to make an ass of yourself (because you just know the minute you open your mouth, whatever smart and witty line you had will flee your mind and you'll be left either mumbling incoherently or falling back on the old standard "Nice shoes....") then you know what I'm talking about, except I feel this way whenever I go to talk to someone. Even if a friend has told me "Keep in touch, okay!" I'm never going to call or email about going out for a drink or coming over for dinner because as soon as I attempt to lift the receiver or open that email, my heart pounds, my lungs collapse, and I hear that friend's voice in my head say "You think I'd want to hang out with you? Seriously? I was just saying that to be nice." Now, imagine asking a stranger to do you a favor that doesn't benefit them at all and overwhelming Social Phobia sets in.

Finally, there's the problem of being raised in a fundamentalist Christian home, where the unwritten, unspoken rule was that "Good things come to those who wait." You don't get heavenly rewards by being demanding, by being greedy, and by going out of your way to cause problems for others. Besides, there's also the idea that if something happens, it's part of a Plan, that you deserve what happened to you and you need to suck it up and move forward. "If you didn't go over your credit limit, you wouldn't have that $35 fee now would you?"

Having said all that, today was a good day. The medicine was working, the sun was shining, and I managed to get out the door -- including putting on make up and getting my bag organized (Rather than just shoving things together at the last minute) -- using only 2 spoons, so it was time to make my move. Two weeks ago, I hosted a party in my apartment which left me unable to get to the bank to deposit my paycheck (just switched banks, so the direct deposit hasn't kicked in yet) for a few days, causing me to overdraft. I've been mentally beating myself up for my stupidity for a week and a half now (another side effect of depression) and finally today, with the appropriate energy reserved and feeling a bit of confidence, I decided to call my bank and ask for those two $35 fees to be refunded.

I armed myself with a copy of I Will Teach You To Be Rich's fee negotiation script, prepared to go to war against the big, evil bank.

At 2:42, I finally got up the nerve to call.

CSR: Thank you for calling Chase Bank. This is Pam. How can I provide you with excellent customer service?
Me: I just saw my bank statement today, and I'm calling to see about getting these fees reversed.

Now, I've gotta confess -- all the stuff in the book about being firm and sounding like you're serious and there to negotiate -- I'm none of those things at that moment. In the moment, no matter how mentally prepared, I'm tiny and girly and very small and non-threatening.

Pam checks my name and ID information.

CSR: I see the fees you're looking at, on November 1st and 2nd. I can credit your account $70.
Me: Oh, that is excellent! Thank you so much.

Pause. Clicking of keys.

CSR: Okay, I've taken care of that for you, and you should see the credit on your account when you next log in. Is there anything else I can do for you today?
Me: Oh, um no. No thank you! I mean, thank you! Thank you so much!

End of the call: 2:46. I was on the phone for a little over 4 minutes and just had $70 put into my account.

Seriously, that's all it took. I didn't get mad, get serious, or sound anything other than small, girlie, and hopelessly awkward, and yet I got exactly what I wanted by just calling and stating what I wanted.

It's just that easy. So why doesn't anyone else do it? Because it takes five minutes, sure, but also because of mental hang ups and because most financial books make it sound so hard. If you can get past those mental barriers -- if you can turn off the nagging that says "No, I went over the limit myself, so I should man up and take my medicine" and is terrified of being told no, you can do it. If someone such as my self, with a crippling social phobia, can do it, you can do it. You just have to make the call.

It's 6:15 pm, and I am sitting on a hard, black wooden bench in the basement of a major department store, staring at a lemon cream colored wall, the fluorescent lights flickering overhead. I just left work an hour ago, still in my suit, make-up touched up in the mirror of the rather-nice public bathroom of the department store, and now, as I'm sitting here, I look down and realize I'm wearing my car shoes -- a pair of black Nine West flip flops -- and my interview shoes are tucked in the draw of my desk back at he office.

Damn it. But, as another minute ticks buy, I realize I probably have enough time to go upstairs to women's shoes, try on, and buy a pair of plain black pumps. After all, my interview was supposed to be at 6:00 PM; I've been sitting here since 5:45 pm, and half an hour later, have yet to even see a manager, let alone Diane, the woman who was supposed to interview me. The woman who, I was told at 5:45, was on dinner break, yet later turned out to have left for the night at 5 PM, even though my interview is scheduled for six.

The clock ticks by.

This interview is a joke, I began to think. The person who was supposed to interview me left for the day before I arrived--which is somehow my fault for using the online interview scheduling utility, if the frustrated mumblings of the HR ladies are to be believed.

Great way to make a first impression on me, the perspective employee.

Job interviewing is like dating--both people in the interview are trying to determine whether or not to enter a relationship with one another. And like dating, the relationship can't be a one-way pursuit with one person desperately trying to impress and the other indifferently detached. If the attraction isn't mutual and the relationship mutually beneficial,why enter into that arrangement?

Sure, like in the dating world, there are people who will jump into bed with the first partner that expresses an attraction to them; those relationships are rarely beneficial beyond a short period of time. There are also those who'll take and keep a completely shitty job just because it's a pay check and they're in a recession. It is this very type of person that will put up with the situation I face now -- watching a plastic clock, the sort they sell at Target for $5, tick away minutes and hours of their lives while being blamed for a clerical mistake on the part of management, HR, or someone within the company.

Just as I stood to leave, a manager rounded the corner.

"You must be Elizabeth," she said, shaking my hand weakly. "I'm Jane, the shoe department manager."

I was there to interview for a second job in cosmetics, because I used to work in cosmetics, because make-up is fun and I could use the discount, since I'm already dropping my main paycheck there anyway. With involuntary furloughs coming soon, I need to keep my cashflow level, not let it dip. This job is to prevent that dip. I'm not a desperate job seeker who'll take shoes instead of make-up because any job is better than know job.

Jane seemed to realize this.

"I'm going to do your first interview; if you still want to work in cosmetics, you'll have to come back to reinterview with Diane."

I made an appointment for a second interview and left around 7 PM. My new interview is tomorrow at 6:30 PM. Hopefully Diane will be there this time.

On March 6th, I called Orchard Bank (a division of HSBC) to lower the APR on my Master Card from 26.9% to 10.9%, the rate of my Orchard Bank Visa. As a short summary of my previous post about this, I called at 1:08 PM and spoke with Rachel, who informed me that she couldn't lower my rate and that the ridiculously high rate must be my fault. For twenty minutes, I argued with her that no, I hadn't missed a payment on any account, no I didn't go over the limit on any account. Finally, I just asked to speak to her manager. I was put on the phone with Pat, a Rachel's superior,  who explained that she couldn't lower my rate either. However, I have another account with them (a VISA which is an older account), and Pat suggested I consolidate the two accounts. I specifically asked what that meant. Pat explained that a consolidation would:

1. Transfer the balance from the high APR card to the VISA (which has an 10.9% APR) and close the Master Card account

2. Transfer the credit limit of the high APR card to the VISA so that I wouldn't lower my total available credit and take a FICO score hit.

3. Keep the VISA's terms and conditions -- including 2% cash back -- intact.

I verified this information with Pat three times, explaining that I currently didn't have a credit limit high enough on the VISA to absorb the total on the Master Card. She assured me each time I asked that I'd transfer both the balance and credit limit, only after she said that they wouldn't consolidate the cards if the limit wasn't high enough to cover the new balance did I agree to do the consolidation. By switching cards, I would save $99 over the course of the year due to the lower interest rate and lower annual fee.

Three weeks later, I received the paperwork in the mail to authorize the consolidation. I filled those out and mailed them back the next day. I continued to make my payments as usual.

Today, I got a notice from Mint.com that my VISA card was over the limit by a few hundred dollars. Scared that someone had my credit card details, I logged into the account to find that the balance transfer had taken place, but not the credit limit transfer. My APR was now at the default rate and I had a $30 penalty! I logged into the Master Card account and discovered that the account was closed.

Assuming it was a mistake, I called Orchard Bank immediately (4/24/09 @ 6:20 PM) and spoke with Jade, a customer service agent at an outsourced call center, who really couldn't be bothered. She explained that the terms and conditions MUST have been clearly explained to me (they weren't). I asked her to raise my credit limit, and she did, but not enough to cover the balance transfer. She also, after I asked, waived the $30 fee, but couldn't help with the APR default. Once again, I asked to speak to a manager.

At 6:29, I was put through to Karen who once again didn't believe that Pat would have made that promise. She seemed more than happy to just tell me the same things Jade had just said -- until I mentioned that I was ready to close the account, because my FICO score had already taken a massive hit with the closing of the account and the overdraft. An informed consumer caused her to "look further" into my account. She stated that the consolidation shouldn't have been completed if they couldn't increase my limit to cover both amounts. However, she still seemed unable to help me until I mentioned that I used to work at BarclayCard, a division of Barclay's bank, as a CAM myself, and I knew there was always something you could do for an account holder such as myself who's never been late or missed a payment, who always pays more than the minimum but never pays the balance in full -- thereby always paying interest and annual fees without complaint. Essentially, I MAKE THEM MONEY, and I know from experience that there are overrides for customers such as myself who are way more valuable than the customer who only pays the minimum and is a high risk and extremely more valuable than the customer who pays his or her bill in full every month. "Computer says no" is not a valid response to a customer like me, and if HSBC believes it is a valid response, then I'll take my money elsewhere.

Suddenly, she was scrambling to find someone to "fix" their mistake, but as it was not 6:35 PM on a Friday evening, she couldn't find anyone. She took my details and promise a personal phone call from herself and her manager no later than Monday night.

Later that night, I got a text message from Mint.com that a $217 minimum payment was due within a week on my Visa card. "Well, that's just silly," I thought. "I have my paper statement right here that says I have a minimum payment of $15 due by 5/1/09 on that card, I've already paid $50 on it this week, and I'm only over my limit right now by $117."

Still, since HSBC has fucked me in the ass pretty badly in the last twenty-four hours, I decided to go check it out online. Sure enough, even though my paper statement says my minimum payment for this month (due by 5/1) is $15, the online account jacked up my minimum payment to $217 due by 5/1/09. That's a week away. If I didn't have online bill pay access and just paid based on the paper statement, I'd have paid $50 when I first received the bill and be sitting here, confident that my bill was paid by more than the minimum while a ticking time bomb sat on the account. Come 5/7 (average date that I receive the bill) not only would there be the balance transfer, the low limit, the higher APR, and the $30 penalty, but there'd additionally be a $30 late payment fee because they increased my minimum payment after billing me.

Then, to add insult to injury, I received another alert that a $30 credit had been applied to my account, this alert from Orchard Bank itself "That's funny," I thought to myself, "I don't see a credit on the account." Then I looked at the card number on the alert.

They applied the credit to the closed and paid in full account.

I have no idea how my situation will resolve -- if it will be resolved at all. I've been promised a return call from Karen and her boss by Monday, at which point I'll raise these new, fun problems with her as well as the original issue. I have, in the interest of the old axiom of CYA (cover your ass) moved $250 from my emergency fund to my checking account. As soon as the money clears (Tuesday, 4/27) I'm going to make the full minimum payment, regardless of the outcome of the call with Karen and her boss. After that, with an intensity that Dave Ramsey himself would probably find terrifying, I'm going to pay off this credit card, pay off the car, and then tell HSBC where to go and how to get there in no uncertain terms.

And just you wait, HSBC. In addition to notifying the Consumerist about this, just wait until I'm debt free. When I call Dave Ramsey for MY debt free scream, just wait until you hear the major bashing you get on the air that day. Just you wait.