My bank has gotten all its going to get.

Before I start, I don't like to talk about actual personal money issues. Its a line I draw and that I don't like to share. I am crossing my line, and this will be my most embarrassing (to me) and uncomfortable (to me) blog I can write. I know, I've written about a lot...but this. ugh.

I can no longer afford to have an account at my current bank. My bank has gone stupid. Well, not stupid, greedy as sin. My bank wasn't stupid. I've been there for a few years. They were friendly. They were helpful. I didn't mind that they had one branch and one ATM in my city, because I liked them. This has all changed.

When I opened my account, the banker told me the best thing about their bank was the 3 day post. What is that? It means, that if you use your credit card, you have three days to make sure there is money in the account, or get money in the account to avoid being overdrawn. Cool. Great for that weekend before payday.

Earlier this year, I had spent some money here and there. Money that was in the bank. I knew that an automatic withdrawal would come out that Monday, but I also had money to deposit that day. No worries. Right? No. They changed the rules that week, and switched how they did the posting, so everything went negative. Like twice. I freaked out. They were charging me $400! What the hell! So I went in and talked to them. They told me that they had changed the rules, but weren't required to tell their customers. They can change what they want, when they want. The bank I opened the account with pissed me off to no end, the manager was rude and stupid. I went to the branch in town to close it down. The woman there was sorry, said I wasn't the only one. They refunded it all back to me. I calmed down. I stayed. (oh, my problem with staying with things that piss me off or screw me over.)

They did some wonky stuff here and there. I personally messed up a few times forgetting their new rule and overdrew myself. There were times when it wasn't my fault, and they still charged me. Sometimes they fixed it. But only sometimes. I dealt with the stupidity. Isn't that what you do in a bad relationship? You forget the shit because overall its ok right? Besides, then I would have to find a new bank.

My bank took advantage of my laziness and lack of going in to bitch. Well, actually, I know they don't care.

You will all know part of my biggest angst in September. My birthday month. My biggest issue that month was my bank. Let me run down the weeks for you.

Three weeks before my birthday. Payday. I pay my bills. I go to the store on Wednesday. I go out to eat on Thursday. I buy something then too. I go out on Friday. I go out on Saturday. I currently have about $490 left in my account after all of this. I know, because I checked my account those days. I saw the transactions posted on my account.

Two weeks before my birthday. Monday was a holiday. There was a direct deposit going into my account the next day. I wrote a check. On Tuesday, I noticed the direct deposit hadn't shown up. I asked my folks (yes, the grown woman gets to ask her folks) to float me some cash until that deposit went through. That night, I looked at my account. The check had not been posted or gone through. The other transactions were still showing on my account. I had not spent any more money since Saturday. I was golden, and even if by some chance what I put in didn't cover the check in full, I was prepared for the overdraft on that check.

I woke up Wednesday. Needed to get gas and pay for school lunches for the boy. I look at my account. -$428 OMG I freaked out! I had no idea what the hell happened! I look at everything. This new check, they put that in that morning. All those transactions that had been on my account all week long? They finally decided to post them 'officially' and of course after they posted the check. THEN they posted the deposit from the night before. Which did make EVERYTHING from the week before over. So they charged me $36 for each of them.

Now while a part of me was going OH SHIT OH FUCK OH SHIT, the other part was going, well, maybe they always put checks through first. So I went through and looked. Nope. Not the norm. Generally checks are the last thing posted on the days I had them. So then I got mad.

I have a friend who works at this bank. I talked to them a bit about it and all they said was, that sucks. Not let me help you, just that sucks. "Oh well." if you will. Seriously!?! MF. So now I was mad and overly embarrassed and sure that if my friend wouldn't look at it to help me, no one else would.

So I lost most of my paycheck that next week. I couldn't pay half my bills. I was running on fumes in my car. I was depressed as hell. I didn't want to celebrate my birthday. I felt like a loser. (Maybe I am, idk, but anyway...) I put some cash to the side, because come hell or high water, I was going to go out on my birthday. (And even though I friend told me they were going to pay for my meal, I wasn't sure. I was also to the point that week where I was like screw it, if I go overdrawn, at least its on my terms!) Thankfully though, I have awesome friends who took care of me that night and I didn't even ask for it. (TANGENT: For those of you with me, yeah, that made my birthday even better, more then you know. I wasn't expecting a good time at all with the mood I was in.)

This had me floating money here and there until my next paycheck. Where before it came I did use my card unwisely. Unlike in September where they took a WEEK to post it though, magically they were able to post it on a SUNDAY!! AMAZING!! So they took another $100 from me.

The next two weeks they did the same. Each time I was ok, they would then slip in another fee that I wasn't expecting (because I didn't think I had gone over) and then I was over, and then I was over twice, so they got to take even more. GO BANK! You rock at this screw people thing! This caused my power to get turned off. This caused me to not be able to pay my water. This caused a huge cluster. I figured a way to work it though. I even was able to still look like everything was fine and join friends out on the weekend. Even if I didn't spend really any money. I made it through with no one the wiser...because you don't talk about this shit with friends and family. Its embarrassing.

This past week, I didn't want to spend any money. I needed to get the kid food. I needed to pay bills. I needed to get clothes. I needed my money, but I was careful. My bank however thought that they would do another thing they'd never done before. They posted withdrawals before a deposit. So, after spending money at the grocery store (more than I usually do, but hey, I had a full paycheck in there, and I needed food in the house) I went home. Happy. My house had food and there was money to pay the bills, and if I played it right, I would have some cash for me.

That was when I saw what my bank had done. They had taken yet another $108 out of my account. This changed things. I worked things out though. I called the places. I maneuvered more things. I had enough to go to Joplin. I had a deposit going in on Monday. Things would be fine until payday. However, I must have 'missed something' (I don't think so, I've been looking) because when I looked at the account last Tuesday and I was negative. $450something SERIOUSLY?! No. I won't do this anymore. I won't. This of course, was also before I had to travel back to Joplin for a funeral.

I didn't put my paycheck in my bank this week. They don't deserve my money. Why is it ok for a bank to change their rules whenever they see fit? I don't make enough for them to take my money. I don't make enough as it is! In the past 3 months they have taken over $1072 of mine! That's almost a full month's pay! I admit, that there is probably $100 in there that I might deserve, but OMG! Who can afford to bank at a place like this? WHO!? The people that already have more than enough money in their account of course, but you can't nickle and dime them, oh, I'm sorry $50 and $100 them.

I am opening up an new account at a new bank. Possibly more than one. Its not right that because we need to be able to write checks and pay bills and have stupid cc because places won't take cash, that we have to deal with banks that don't give a patooty about their customers.

As I was not talking about this to a friend, but saying how I am going to be embarrassed as hell once I post it, we talked about how, maybe they rely on that. They rely on people being too embarrassed about what little money they have, or what mistakes they made, or how much they have, to say anything to other people when the bank messes up. We clam up. We take it. I don't want you judging me, so I won't say anything. I will suffer in silence and you can keep beating me, because I am too embarrassed to say how shitty and wrong it really is.

I may not keep a high balance. I may have to use every cent in my account every two weeks, but I earned that. I did not earn the right for the bank to change the rules to make it easier for them to take my money. No one deserves their financial institution to 'change the rules' whenever they feel like it.

I am not holding out hopes for the bank to see the error of their computers when I go in to talk to them. The way they have been this year means that they no longer care who is a customer, as long as they got your money. I will be sharing the name of this bank. But I am going to wait until I close my account fully. Which will be this week. Providing nothing bad happens, it will be tomorrow. Two days longer then I wanted, 8 months longer then it should have been.

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ugh, my head hurts...and my stomach is turning because this subject sickens me, makes me feel bad, stupid, helpless, and embarrassed. I can't write poetry tonight. Even the breezes outside can calm my spirit for it. Stupid banks.