This is a story of both a bad customer and a bad employee. It happened when I was sixteen in the mid-nineties. My parents had a deep mistrust of “the man” and spent their lives trying to avoid things like paying taxes or anything that meant their money might be taken by “the man”.
As a teenager, I just wanted to live normally, like my friends, and, at this particular time, one of my biggest bugbears was that I didn’t have a bank account. My parents did have an account for essentials and things they couldn’t get around, but most of our household money was squirreled away at home.
I had some money of my own, but relied on my parents to keep a log of this and hand me cash when I wanted. I saw friends having much more freedom and control over access to their money, and I wanted to be like them. Also, I wanted to get a part-time job and needed a bank account for that. Up to this point, I had been working ad hoc as a waitress in a family friend’s cafe and was paid cash-in-hand, with that cash going into my dad’s pillowcase, or wherever the family money was kept.
My friends also made comments about me not being as grown up as them, because I had to ask my parents for money and didn’t know how to use a bank. At age sixteen, in the nineties, not being seen as grown up was a big deal, so I begged my parents to let me open an account, and finally, my mum agreed.
We went to the High Street Bank one day around lunchtime (it must have been school holidays). The queue was enormous, and we waited at least thirty minutes before finally reaching the teller.
Mum explained that we wanted to open an account, and the teller immediately became a bit anxious, looking around us at the long line of customers, and explained that we couldn’t just walk in to do this. We should have made an appointment, and appointments for this sort of thing are not available over lunchtimes, which are the busiest times, and all staff are needed for basic transactions.
My mum suddenly exploded, which was a common personality trait. She started yelling at the teller, saying she was here to do business and was not leaving. She said it was horrible customer service, and she had waited in line for such a long time and would not now be turned away.
The teller stood her ground and said there was an appointment later that day at 3 PM, but that was all she could offer. Mum had other plans later, so she couldn’t make that time and continued to argue, her voice getting louder and louder.
I was feeling so uncomfortable in the middle of this and could tell that my mum was in the wrong. Eventually, I spoke up and said I could take the 3 PM appointment on my own and really didn’t need (or want – but I didn’t say that) my mum there.
After a bit more arguing with me, as well as the teller, Mum relented. I was given information about the types of documentation I would need to bring later in the afternoon, and, to everyone’s relief, we finally left the bank.
Going back later in the afternoon, I was quite nervous and even more so when I realised it was the same staff member who would be dealing with my account. I was a very shy teenager who hated confrontation, and the staff member was clearly offhand and abrupt with me, so I decided to mention the elephant in the room:
Me: “I just want to say, umm, before we get properly started, that I’m, umm, sorry about my mum earlier. She, umm, doesn’t really know how these things work.”
She said she accepted and appreciated my apology, but that my mum had been totally out of order. I agreed and hoped that would be the end of it, but no, throughout the entire appointment, she bad-mouthed my mother, saying some very inappropriate things, and just wouldn’t let the subject drop.
She kept saying that I seemed like such a nice girl and how could I possibly have such a terrible mother, also wagging her finger at me and telling me not to turn out like that. She even started criticising my mum’s appearance, her clothes, and her haircut.
I was sitting there thinking that yes, my mum had been in the wrong, and I felt sorry for the member of staff who had had to deal with that stress, but it also wasn’t a great look to be so openly and harshly critical of a teenager’s mother. Two wrongs definitely don’t make a right.
