From: "Keith F. Lynch" <kfl at KeithLynch.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Bank dirty tricks
Date: Thu, 23 Jun 2016 22:19:06 -0400 (EDT)
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

The plot thickens:  I returned to the bank this morning, hoping that
they would have straightened everything out.  The person I spoke to
last time directed me to the branch manager, who hadn't been there
last time.  I asked him for an update, and he stared at me in blank
incomprehension.  It turned out he hadn't been filled in.  Apparently
the person I spoke to last time said and did nothing after I left.

So I went through the whole thing again, even more annoyed than last
time.  He checked on his computer.  We talked some more, at cross
purposes until I realized that he was claiming, not that I had agreed
years ago to an auto-renewal at a homeopathic interest rate, but that
I had, just last month, signed up in person for the new CD.  I asked
him three times to make sure that's really what he was claiming.

So of course I asked him to show me the contract that "I" had signed
last month.  He left his office, presumably to search for it, but
I didn't see where he went or what he did.  After a few minutes he
returned, then used his computer for what seemed like a long time.
Finally, he turned the monitor to show me a contract on the screen.
The contract was undated and unsigned.

I told him that he had failed to show evidence that I had signed it.
I asked him if the camera footage from last month had been preserved,
as I wanted to get a good look at "myself."  He refused to answer,
saying that their security policies were secret.  Neither would he
tell me on what day "I" had been there.

He said that if it was up to him, he'd reverse the $200 penalty, but
he doesn't have that power.  I asked him who does have that power.
He claimed that nobody in the bank does.  He clarified that by "the
bank," he doesn't just mean that branch, he means the whole thing.
He claimed that even the bank's president didn't have that power.
And that neither did anyone have the power to change the interest
rate on an existing CD.

After further argument, he agreed to have someone from headquarters
phone me at home.  He wouldn't give me their name or number, or tell
me when I should expect the call.

This is bizarre.  Am I really supposed to believe that someone is
impersonating me, and doing so well enough to trick the bank into
thinking he's me?  How would this person have known what bank I have?
I've certainly never mentioned it on Usenet or in email, and probably
not in person.  (I just searched all my saved email and newsgroup
postings for the past five years for my bank's name, and sure enough
it's not there.)  Of course anyone I've paid a check to would know.
But since moving to this bank four years ago I've only written checks
to utilities and to my landlord/housemate.  I'm sure he wouldn't
pretend to be me, and that he wouldn't succeed if he did pretend,
as he looks nothing like me.

More to the point, how would the imposter have known I had a large CD
maturing?  I'm quite sure *nobody* knew that except within the bank.
Even I didn't remember.  My landlord/housemate could have found out
by searching through my papers, but I don't believe he would do that,
nor do I believe he could do it without leaving traces.  Especially
since my filing system is very non-obvious, so he'd have to do a very
thorough search of my room to find it.

Also, why would this imposter have put my money in a low-rate CD when
he could just as easily have simply taken all the money?

And how did this imposter manage to avoid leaving a copy of the
contract he signed?

It just doesn't pass the smell test.  And I don't understand why the
bank manager thinks it would.

Maybe it's reverse psychology?  Make up a sufficiently absurd story,
and I'm supposed to conclude that nobody would make up such an absurd
story, so it must be true?

Or maybe I'm supposed to believe that it really was me, and that I was
sleep-banking, presumably while carrying a pen with disappearing ink.

Any suggestions?