As Dante and Virgil descend into the Fourth Circle of the Inferno, they meet Plutus, the god of Wealth. At a word from Virgil, Plutus falls to the ground. Entering the Fourth Circle, Dante notes that "more shades were here than anywhere else."
Wikipedia tells us the fourth circle is where Dante finds, "The greedy who hoarded possessions and the indulgent who squandered them."
I don't know much about old Dante but Gilda Radner playing Roseanne Rosannadanna had it right with her line, "It just goes to show ya....it's always something."
This something falls in the category of automated phone service hell with a little large corporate greed and indulgent squandering on my part, which qualified it for the fourth circle nomination.
We have an investment plan where I work that is managed by a large financial services firm on the East coast, you may have heard of, called CitiStreet. In my case it's mostly an IRA deal but I put some bit of money in there after taxes as a savings method for short term/immediate needs.
If one reads the CitiStreet PR for their money management arm you'd think they were a nice kindly friend that just wants to help you with your finances. As they say, "That's why, at CitiStreet, your personal retirement planning specialist, we want to help you learn why it's important to save for retirement, how much you need to save, and how to optimize your savings. "
Last night I decided to draw out a little of my after tax money for Christmas holiday expenses. For anyone not into investment/IRA's; after-tax money is money you already paid income taxes on and then put in a bank, or under your mattress, or on the Seahawks +6...or whatever you like. You can also pur money in an IRA before-tax. If you withdraw that money before you retire there will be substantial penalties..up to and not excluding a firing squad.
You can do a lot on this particular CitiStreet website, but not ask for a withdrawal. I have no idea why that is since it's a secure site similar to one you would use to do any other online banking or purchasing but for withdrawing your money you have to call.
Actually I'll get to why I think it works that way a little later, please bear with me.
A good example in my mind of a secure website would be Amazon.com or any of a million or so similar, although maybe not so sophisticated as to have created a special "Jack's Gold Box" for me to peruse crap they would like to get rid of.
A good example of a automated phone system is the one pharmacies use. You call, enter your prescription number and a couple of minutes later you are done and they will mail you your drugs....simple no problem. And it works for something as life critical as Prescription Drugs. One would think a similar service could be set up by CitiStreet for something so non-life critical as withdrawing funds.
Here's the drill for getting at your money managed by CitiStreet -
Go to the webpage. Look around for instructions on how to withdraw funds. Find that you can transfer, buy, sell and do a bunch of stuff with stock/money market funds on the web...but not actually request they send you a check, or maybe in this age of electronic fund transfers actually put the money in your bank account.
Get the number to call to withdraw money from the website.
Call.
Enter ID.
Enter password.
Wait for a lengthy explanation of what you can do online. It's actually a digital voice saying v e r y s l o w l y "you can go to h t t p colon forward slash forward slash w w w dot......"
Grrrrrr. I just came from the stinking webpage. I know what I can do there. Okay deep breath.
Go through several levels of automated phone purgatory.
End up at the "withdraw after tax funds". Listen to a long spiel that Federal law requires you have received and read a tax information letter 90 days prior to making any withdrawal. If you have received and read the Federal...blah blah blah, press one to confirm you have received and read the Federal...blah blah blah.
Grrrrrrr. This is after tax money. I paid taxes on it already. Deep breath.
I enter the amount I want to withdraw and the automated voice says "you may elect to have a check mailed to your home address or have a direct deposit to your credit union". It then gives 4 or 5 credit unions...so you have to listen to the voice say...or "have a direct deposit to your Philadelphia Can Workers Employees Credit Union" or blah blah blah 4 or 5 times.
I have an account at one of the credit unions. (I've tried this before and it never works but I thought maybe it was fixed.) I go through the steps to have the money direct deposited, but the automated system keeps looping back through the "you may make a direct deposit to your Philadelphia Can Workers Employees Credit Union etc." spiel.
I double starred my way out of the 4th level of hell and got a human. The conversation goes like this.
Me, "I'd like to make a direct deposit to my savings account but your automated system doesn't work."
Human, "I'm sorry."
Me, "Can you help me with that?"
Human, "No that's an automated system. We have no control over it here at the customer service center."
(I've had it happen before where the human at the "help" center tells me I have to call the machine back to get whatever I wanted done, but never anyone that was so honest to say..."yes we know that doesn't work but I can't fix it.")
Me, "I've tried this direct deposit before and it never works."
Human, "I know. It doesn't work. It only works for a few people."
Me, "But can someone fix it?"
Human, "No it's an automated system."
I swear to God this is the true gist of the conversation. Finally I ended up agreeing to pay 35 bucks to have a check sent by UPS.
Here's what I think the deal is with those slimy bastards (sorry). I don't mean the call center guy. He's just doing his job. I think what they like to do is use your money for the float. Hey those nickels and dimes add up when you have thousands of people's savings and retirement funds under your control.
The scam is they like to cut you a check. That way they can screw around with your money for a day or longer and not have to have it invested earning you money...they can have it invested earning them money.
I wrote to the SEC about this one time (not the exact scenario it was a dividend check) but same idea..and same company (different name last year). The SEC sends copies of those letters to the company in question and they cut my check loose in a matter of hours. The only problem was they had the money in limbo (skimming interest/earnings off the top) for a week or more. Bastards.
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I need to get into a more Christmasy spirit. At least I have a job and some money and some people who care about me. It's really not what you have but who you know and love.
Yesterday I was talking to my Beirut friend. We were discussing airport security and how he get's tagged because of his appearance sometimes. I was grousing about getting what I perceived as being hassled one time because I didn't take off my shoes. I thought it was optional and the uniformed security guard was upset because that required he wand me (that sounds weird).
Brief aside about airport security - I think Dodgeball is funny where they mention in passing that the slow kid worked at an airport before he went to work at Average Joe's. When the guy from the dodgeball team who dresses and acts like a pirate runs off..his buddy says to the kid, "Steve the pirate is gone." The kid says, "We have a pirate on our team?" You have to see it to appreciate.
Back to that conversation yesterday. So I'm griping about getting wanded. My Beirut buddy says yeah that airport security can be tough. A few times they've insisted I take off my artificial leg.
True story.
Thank God for small problems.
God Bless You and Yours
