You'd better get started, now's the time

[austin_dern]

I wrote and mailed out a check today. This interests me because I have peculiar interests, and because -- based on the carbonless copies in my book -- this was the first check I've written in sixteen months. Granted I've never written many checks -- I believe my nearly ten-year-old HSBC account is up to check number 187 -- but I'm amazed how completely my need for them has collapsed.

Part of the collapse is electronic checking. I started doing that my first jaunt to Singapore, when I figured it'd save several useful days; I assumed the process of getting bills forwarded to my parents, them checking the amounts, and telling me would add irritating delays, and it has. Now I just have student loans as regular payments demanding U.S. money.

Here, my rent's automatically deducted. Water and power is charged through something called a Giro system, in which they send me a bill and I have two weeks to dispute any charges; if I don't, payment's automatically deducted. I could set up the same thing for my cable and phone, but prefer to pay them at automated stations -- using my bank debit card -- since at least one of the competing automated stations is throwing a contest every month, and I want to feel like I have some involvement with my bill-paying process.

The thing I still can't get over is my US debit and credit cards work fine in Singapore -- the H in HSBC stands for ``Hong Kong'' -- and my Singapore bank card works fine in U.S. ATMs. Until this year they didn't even charge for using a non-bank ATM, and they still don't charge for the currency conversion. I still remember my first international trip spending a good half-hour signing traveller's checks and spending days wandering around West German or Swiss hotels looking for a place to trade them for local money. I'm amazed how seamlessly it all works.

I signed the wrong date on my check of today, though. I don't know why I do this, but I feel better if I date any faintly legal document incorrectly. Odd? Yes, but not really odder than my habit of keeping toothpaste in the fridge; it just has less logical reason for it.

Trivia: The last Byzantine historians known to record the present-day goings-on were Nikephoros Gregoras and the Emperor John Cantacuzene, who wrote after his abdication in 1354. No contemporary records from the Byzantines of their last century are known to exist. Source: The End of the Byzantine Empire, D.M. Nicol

Currently Reading: Military Errors of World War II, Kenneth Macksey.

Comments

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

Toothpaste in the fridge? The thought makes me squirm, as my teeth are very cold sensitive. Even the cool tap water I use to brush them can bother them a bit at times.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I'd always thought my teeth were sensitive, but the taste and feel turned out to be pretty good. That may just be that living in an eternal heat wave most anything chilly is an improvement, though. It doesn't stay cold long.

[luckybunny007.livejournal.com]

HSBC has been the biggest banking chain in the UK for donkey's years now. Funny old world.

[oliver-otter.livejournal.com]

Before HSBC bought the bank Austin and I both still have accounts at, it was Marine Midland.

Which made the quirky ATM machines at the RPI branch of the bank MMMMMs. Marine Midland Money Maybe? Machines.

Overall, I've been quite happy with HSBC, other than changing the logo from Marine Midland's lovely tall ship icon.

Time to finally cancel out that account, though, and find a bank in Arizona.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I've still got a Marine Midland dry-erase board. In fact, it's one of the things I brought to Singapore, along with a Flag Acres Zoo raccoon magnet and a Lansingburg Family Health Center magnet, to spruce up my fridge.

But I've been consistently amazed at how far out HSBC has sprawled. They run a lot of ads here about the value of local knowledge, usually showing well-meaning folks doing incredibly dumb things because they didn't know that signing OK is considered quite rude in Brazil or the like.

I'd have stuck with them for my Singapore banking but the RPI branch was confident I'd need completely separate accounts anyway, so I went here with the DBS Bank of Singapore -- given the D stands for Development, guess what the B and the S stand for -- because they had a branch at the National University Hospital, a convenient and short walk from campus and my office. Unfortunately that office closed last year after the SARS scare forced people to go through screening before entering the hospital. But I'm sticking with DBS since, well, no sense moving. I'd have to take a bus to get to the bank anyway.

One minor nuisance with HSBC is they haven't got a bank in New Jersey, which is home when I'm in North America anymore ... so all my banking with them needs to be done electronically or by physical mail. This works remarkably well, but I wonder what the gang at the RPI Union thinks when they get letters from Singapore with a request for deposits or the like. Good thing I grabbed a bunch of their paper slips before leaving Troy.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

I'm making a slow shift towards electronic banking, myself; I used to write very frequent checks, and in fact, never bothered with an ATM card until last year. It was inconvenient at times.. but at school, the check cashing office was free, fairly convenient, and would give valuble rolls of quarters; back in CT, checks and cash and credit cards managed quite well.. albeit, with the credit cards slipping me into danger sometimes.
Last year when I recieved my $5000 consolidation loan, I asked about an ATM card.. and was told they offered a all-in-one ATm and debit card. I opted for it, and it's become my preferred method of payment now over checks- which I no longer use except for mailed bills. I'd move towards electronic banking, but I find i have a better mental handle still from seeing the bills and mailing them out, then the electronic method.
I am using a few EBT (Electonic Balance Transfers) for my insurance and such, and I'm getting steaidly more inclined to shift money towards my consolidation loan through Navy Federal Credit Union's online site. That's jsut a change from $50 a week in person to $50 a week by computer, though.

So, two questions: 'Automated Stations'? And what was the check for?

--Chiaroscuro

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Oh, the stations look sort of like ATMs, although they come with full screens and metal keyboards with the space bar split into two pieces. Don't ask me why. You start it up by selecting which of a wide number of services (phone companies, cable, power, et cetera) you want to pay; then slide the side of your bill with a bar code into the laser scanner. Then, well, slide in your bank card and pay it just like a self-check-out station. Take back your card, your receipt, and on several occasions a coupon for a nearby store, and hope you win the big S$8000 giveaway.

The keyboard's there in case the laser doesn't read it and you have to enter data by hand -- entering the account and bill number is enough, but you can enter your full name and such -- or to write feedback.

The check was alumni membership fees for the amateur radio club at RPI. That's too rare a payee to be worth adding to my electronic checking roster, and the mailing address (to the club president, pretty much) would change every year anyway.