I work as a customer service operator for a bank. Our offices are closed due to the health crisis.

Me: “Hello, how may I help you?”

Caller: “I need to change my bank number and I need to change it fast! Like, now. At this moment. Now.”

Me: “All right. In order for us to change your bank number, we need your signature. We have a form for that on our site, so you can download it and fill it in. You can mail it back at us to [email address].”

Caller: “I don’t know how to find that; I’m terrible with computers.”

Me: “I understand. Do you want me to mail it to you?”

Caller: “No, I don’t have a printer. Can’t I come pick one up?”

Me: “Unfortunately, our offices are closed due to lockdown. You could always ask someone else to print the form or go to the library, or I could send you one by post.”

Caller: “But that takes too long!”

Me: “I’m very sorry, but that are the options we have. We can’t change someone’s bank number without their signature.”

Caller: “Ugh, never mind. I’ll just print it myself!” *Ends the call abruptly*

Wait… didn’t she just say she didn’t have a printer?

I am the bad worker in this case. I work at a bank call center and have recently put in my notice to work elsewhere. My supervisor is also a friend, so she understands my decision.

It is my last day and I receive a call from a very unhappy customer regarding one overdraft fee he received after visiting an ATM and withdrawing money that he did not have. After a while:

Customer: “You know, this level of service you guys have provided is just terrible. I have half a mind to leave this bank.”

Me: “I’m sorry you feel that way, sir, and if you do wish to close your account, I can help you do that.”

Customer: “I mean, how do you live with yourself, charging all those fees to innocent people?”

Me: “You know what? You’re right. I can’t live like this anymore. I quit.”

Customer: “I’m sorry, what?”

Me: “I quit. After I hang up with you, I’m going to my supervisor’s office and telling her that I quit, that I can’t live with myself.”

Customer: *Quietly* “Bulls***.”

Me: “No. I quit. I’m done. I quit. Do you want me to transfer you to a current employee?” 

Customer: “I mean… you’re quitting?”

Me: “Yes, Mr. [Last Name].You’ve shown me the light. I hope you have a really nice life.”

Customer: “Um, okay… well… bye, I guess.”

After I told my supervisor to listen to the recorded call, she laughed so hard she cried. She later told me that the same customer called back to ask for me the next day. When he was told that I quit, he told my former coworker, “Wow. I really did that.”

I work for a local credit union, and we generally have friendly relationships with all of the other local credit unions, as we tend to see each other at training and chamber events.

I am working on a Saturday, answering phones, when a teller from another credit union calls to verify a cashier’s check. It is standard procedure that those are only verified Monday through Friday by our accounting department. 

Me: “Thank you for calling [Credit Union]; how may I help you?”

Teller: “Yes, I need to verify… I guess you would call this a bank check?”

Me: “A cashier’s check? Unfortunately, those are verified by our accounting department on Monday through Friday.”

Teller: “You’re kidding? Let me have your automated system.”

Me: “Our automated system does not verify cashier’s checks. That can only be done by our accounting department.”

Teller: “That is so stupid!“

Me: *Slightly shocked* “Well, [Teller], you know that alerts have been going out recently from the local police department about stolen cashier’s checks from credit unions. This is all to prevent fraud.”

Teller: “MANAGER. NOW. How dare you accuse me of fraud?! You know what? I don’t have time for this. I’ll tell our member and yours that you refused to help me. I hope you get fired.” *Click*

I sent a companywide email out explaining what happened, and a few minutes later, I got a phone call from our CEO asking for more details. It turned out that our CEO is great friends and golf buddies with the CEO of the other credit union. They were on the golf course together when our CEO got the email. He mentioned the teller’s rudeness to the other CEO, who wanted to speak to his employee right away. She was a new hire, and her credit union has the exact same policy as ours. From what I hear, she got an earful about her rudeness.

I’m working at a bank, and my main job is to sit down with customers in an office for basically anything that you might come to a bank for that’s more complex than basic transactions.

One of my regulars is a gentleman who is very nice but also very paranoid. He refuses to allow mail, even though he already uses a post office box, because “people keep getting into his box.”

To get around mandatory disclosure requirements, he sets up all statements to be online… but he never sets up an online account or checks his emails because he doesn’t trust them, either. Some disclosures are important enough that when they are not opened online, they will automatically be mailed — in particular, the mandatory disclosure of when a share certificate is coming due. And he has a lot of share certificates.

Whenever he receives one of these notices, he comes in and opens a new account and closes the old one due to his fear that the mail that came from the bank was pulled out of his post office box, read, and then put back exactly how it was, included resealing the envelope, to try to fool him. He also will close out certificates early, paying the early close penalty, only to open a new one right away, just to avoid those renewal notices going out.  

I work with him a lot, opening up new accounts and share certificates. Part of his paranoia is that people are trying to steal from him, sometimes with very convoluted reasoning, so you’d better believe that I am even more careful than I always am about making certain everything is done perfectly, with absolutely nothing that could hint at a break of privacy. I also never skip out on requesting the multiple passwords on his account or checking the two IDs — his account request, not our policy.

So he trusts me. And he decides that he will show this trust… by trying to give me money.

At first, he just straight-up offers cash — $20 or $50 bills — as tips. I explain that I work for a bank. I cannot take tips or financial gifts.  

Then, he starts hiding the cash in my office. He’s not very good and I always check my office for private materials left before taking the next customer, so I just take the cash to the teller line and have it deposited into his account. I have no way to call him, either, by the way; he doesn’t trust phones.

I have my manager talk to him about this. It turns out he’s picked up this habit with the other employees that he trusts to help him also. After the manager talks to him about it, he switches to gift cards.  

Those are still refused. Keep in mind, these are not $5 cards; they are $50 or $100. I make a folder for him in the lock files just to be able to hold any cards that get left behind so we can return them the next time he comes in.

I get smart. I let him know that if he leaves any gift cards behind, I will have to mail them back to him.

The attempted gifts immediately stop.

Back in 1964, when my brother was in fourth grade, he did so well in French class that the teacher gave him a French franc as a reward.

Since he is not a sentimental person, he and my other brother took it to the bank down the street to find out how much it was worth.

They came back all upset. They announced that the bank manager had said it wasn’t worth anything and he was kind enough to take it off their hands.

Imagine swindling a fourth-grader.