Don't watch out for me.

I am watching a story this morning on WSB Channel 2 about a distraught woman who was victimized by fraud. Fraud appals me. In my job, I see dozens of cases (and I am being thrifty) of fraud each week. The lady on the television suffers from Parkisans and had entrusted a friend to do her finances. The "friend" drained her account of thousands of dollars. Like I said, I see this EVERY WEEK! It is a full time job to be a crook and they are getting better at it daily.
First let me say that my job is to take care of our clients. When I say take care, I mean protect their accounts and money they have entrusted to my bank. I often do this with a smile on my face and I often try to remember names and faces. Customer service! I have been doing this for years. However, in my experience I have never really been in charge of other peoples money. Look at my last statement; "in CHARGE of other people's money". I have been entrusted by my company to ensure if you have an account with my bank it will be safe. This means if someone comes in trying to commit fraud on your account, I have been trained to catch it and stop it.
Lets go back to the poor woman who was wronged. The premise of the news cast was not in so many ways reporting how the friend took advantage of her, it was more to point a finger at my company for not refunding the money she lost. I want to make it clear that if a real fraud takes place with one of our clients, the client will be given all the help and in most cases all of their money is refunded. In this case I am most certain the person that was handling her case dropped the ball and the correct information was not given to our fraud department. Luckily, the case will be re-opened and better scrutiny given.
The woman who was victimized was questioning how her account was accessed without her authorization. In all circumstances the account should have never been accessed. However, here is reality. With banks being scrutinized daily on how they do business, how they charge fees and how they are out to hurt everybody, customer service has to be at an all time high. Upper management have and will terminate employment of a team member who does not give the best customer service. With this in mind think about the last time you went to your bank. Did you withdraw money? If so, did you offer your license and debit card as ID? Did you swipe your debit card and enter a PIN to verify your identification? Did the teller/banker even ask you for such information? If you answered yes to all the questions, you completed a successful banking transaction. If you said no to any of the questions you have been marked as either a "known" customer or an "irate" customer. You see the reality is we deal with mean people. I am not saying we deal with rude, obnoxious, or even attitude customers...I am talking MEAN people! We either have the mean person who is attempting to defraud the bank or we have the mean person who is getting mad because we ASKED for their ID! If we ask for an ID in most cases, here is what happens:

1. Welcome, how can I help you?
2. I need to make a withdrawal.
3. My pleasure, could you please swipe your debit card in order for me to pull up the correct account?
4. I don't have a debit card! Clark Howard told me to NEVER get a debit card from you people!
5. OK, that is not a problem. Could I see your drivers license and a second form of ID?
6. What do you need that for? I just want to pull some money out of my account!
7. I apologize for the inconvenience, however in order to verify your identity as an authorized signer on the account, I will need to see your identification or have you enter a valid PIN from a debit card attached to your account.
8. Are you new? Don't you know who I am? I have been banking here for 20 years! I have thousands of dollars in this bank!
9. Again, my apologies. We do sometimes have new faces here at the bank however it is standard that we identify each individual in order to protect our customers accounts.
10. This is ridiculous! I want to see your manager! I hate coming here! I am going to move my accounts! I don't understand why I have to show you my ID to withdraw my money!?

Did you read the last part?? Yes, people actually say they don't understand why we would want to identify them!
OK, back to the lady who was victimized. I am not saying this is what happened, but what could have happened is the crook had been doing the victims financial business at the same branch over and over. She had a history of helping the victim and the tellers did not want anything to happen to the victim and believed the crook was taking care of her. This should not have happened but more than likely the tellers did not want to have a break in service so they complied.
Let me make it clear. At my branch, my MOTHER has to show her ID. I will not allow my tellers to put their job on the line for a loudmouth "self-entitled" customer. I don't care how much money they have. I want to keep what little I make so I FOLLOW THE RULES! Hate the banks all you want to folks. Believe me, my bank is not doing me ANY favors in the wallet department. However, I detest criminals. I will do my best to stop any and all fraud. People should be happy that I am on watch.
For those of you that think you have so much money that every banker/teller should know you; try thanking that teller that asks you for your ID. You never know, someone may have just been in the bank an hour before posing as you trying to steal your money.