I was 25, lonely and broke in October 1995, when I bounced three checks in as many days. My landlord had managed to cash my rent check early, though I had dated it for the following week. In quick succession, checks to my insurance, credit card, and phone companies each bounced.
My bad luck did not stun me as much as the note I received from my bank the next week. They had penalized me $20 for each bounce. Since each company had twice tried to cash my checks, the bank was charging me $120. And since everyone who received a bad check also charged me $20, I was set back a total of one hundred and eighty dollars for my sloppy bookkeeping.
My mind snapped.
Angered, but not discouraged, I snatched the phone receiver and began a four-hour session of yelling, pleading and arguing with representatives from each of these companies. By lunch, I had recouped all but $60.
Sound impossible? No, for small amounts of money, you too can battle the big boys and win, with a simple strategy.
Convince yourself you are truly right.
It may seem trivial, but a conviction that you are truly right is the one weapon most people do not possess when arguing powerful entities. With conviction, even ludicrous arguments sound correct. When talking to a representative from my insurance company, I declared that their $20 penalty to customers for submitting bounced checks was an "oppressive fee, nearly criminal" with the casual confidence of someone confirming his name. They refunded the charge.
At the very least, strong conviction will give you enough energy to bore someone into giving up. With Citibank, I spent a half-hour explaining to the representative that their fees served a very "typical capitalist agenda." With a sigh, she credited $20 to my account.
Gaining true conviction is more difficult when you are the one who has broken the rules. People have a problem with this. They believe they are wrong if they have broken "the rules." With my bounced checks, for example, there was no bank error. I wrote a check for money I didn't have.
The trick is realizing that breaking rules doesn't mean you're wrong -- if the rule is unfair. Rules involving huge institutions were set up by other huge institutions, in such a way that you will always be wrong, and that will always owe money. If you write a check for $40 and it bounces, you owe forty, plus a penalty. If a bank mistakenly deducts $40 from your account, they'll refund the money, but will not owe a penalty. Fair?
No, but we pay up anyway. Just like we pay $1 to use an automatic teller machine. And we pay a monthly service charge, in addition to paying for a set of checks, in addition to paying for each check we use.
Imagine this system set up between parties of the same power. Say you are playing basketball, and step out of bounds. Your opponent, a friend of equal athletic ability, produces a legal document declaring that you must be penalized a point for stepping out of bounds, while he would not suffer such a penalty. Would you accept, or laugh in his face?
I pretended he was my roommate, charging me double rent for being one day late. "This was one incident," I responded, "and you punished me six times." I informed him that his bank was a petty, merciless, and untruthful institution, and he should be ashamed to be working for an criminal employer.
Too far? The bank agreed to dismiss half of the charges as a show of good faith.
Sure, I sounded ludicrous. Since I delivered these speeches at work, allowing six neighboring cubicles to enjoy the spectacle of a man making irrational declarations for an entire morning. But it was necessary to be illogical. With logic, they would have won. With emotion, I had broken even.
Or even better. Six months later, when I closed my account, I received what I interpreted to be a sign that I had been right. The bank mailed a check to me which was supposed to be in the amount of my closing balance. They had included, by mistake, $60 too much.
A bank error in my favor. I accepted without penalty.
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Copyright 1997 Will Hines
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Of all financial penalties, bounced check fees anger me the most, because they are the most pointless and petty. Could fining someone immediately after he demonstrates that he has no money be anything but vindictive? It's like an optician refusing to give out glasses until his patients beat him in a game of darts.
When fighting a wealthier party, don't follow the logic of the rule as it is written. Seize upon the underlying unfairness. Demand the same fairness you would from an entity of equal power. When my checks bounced, I complained to my bank of the time (BayBank, which is now BankBoston) that I wanted the charges dropped. The representative politely reminded me that it was I who had written the checks, and therefore only fair that I pay the penalty.
