In the Bank

(My dream journal dated 10 April 2005)

My husband and I are in a bank.

This bank is nothing like the banks here in New Zealand, where we normally do our dealings through the counter or talk to an bank consultant at his/her desk or office. Rather, it is a big open-plan office. There are many banking consultants in this office, most of them are female. There is no office partition to divide the office space. It looks like an open market as a matter of fact.

I am talking to a female banking consultant with my husband nearby somewhere. The consultant looks in her forties. Although appearing friendly to me, I feel that she is only half hearted in her job. I don’t think she is that interested in helping me sort out my finance.

I ask her to withdraw a lump sum from our joint bank account. Instead of warning me that such big amount of cash perhaps is not the most sensible thing to do, she processes it without asking any question or given any advice. Watching her counting the notes, I suddenly realise that there is a risk for me to carry so much cash with me walking on the street as it amounts to $14,000. I am a bit worried at this point and start looking for my husband. I yell his name, almost like a screaming. I am sure the whole office can hear me. When I find him, I try to explain to him that I don’t feel comfortable with carrying so much cash. We then both try to get the banking consultant to change our instructions and issue a bank cheque instead of giving us the cash. She says that the transaction has already been effected and cannot be reversed.

When she gives me the cash, I notice that my handbag is too small to contain it all. As we frustratingly exit the office, there is a stand-alone front-line reception at the entrance. There is an Asian man standing behind a huge desk. He looks like in his twenties and I wonder if he is a new graduate. Unlike our banking consultant, he appears very friendly and dedicated to helping customers. We ask him if it is possible if we re-deposit the cash we have just drawn and ask for a bank cheque for the same amount.

He says no problem. We are pleased that he is so helpful. However, he explains that the bank cheque won’t be a round figure of $14,000. There is a small loss incurred due to the foreign exchange difference between the buy rate and sell rate. We got a sell rate when we cashed out which was in our favour. However, since we now want to re-deposit it back the buy rate would apply this time, which is lower than the sell rate. Effectively the cheque amount would be something like $13,7##.

I tell my husband that we’ve just been taught a lesson over this money transaction and we need to be careful on our money matters in the future.