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charlesfwh
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Name: Charles
Location: London, United Kingdom
Birthday: 12/23/1983
Gender: Male
Interests: Leeds United, Italian food, Indian Food, Enterprise, Buffy/Angel, Bon Jovi music, Lost, Resident Evil, digital photography, computing, dvds, cinema, mp3 files, Cinema Ice Cream, Rome, travelling, site seeing, football, rugby, ebay, collecting pictures, helping people out, talking, my mobile phone, wrestling.
Expertise: Saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, luck, landing on my feet, Baldurs Gate video game, computing, movie knowledge.
Occupation: Student
Industry: Retail
Message: message meEmail: email me
MSN: greenfordborg@aol.com
Yahoo:  greenyborg@yahoo.co.uk
Member Since:
12/19/2004
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Working in a bank has become the new vogue for anger and cynicism, I've mentioned it before but daily there is usually the individual who'll make the accusation they pay my salary and own the bank I work for, therefore I should be default forget their overdraft fee's or accept they've missed loan or credit card payments because its 'their bank'. Sometimes people can be idiots and this 'news' story on the sky website effectively highlights my point that people can be idiots at times.
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Business/Protester-Who-Bricked-Up-Barclays-Bank-Wants-More-Help-From-Tycoons-To-Help-Turn-Economy-Around/Article/201009415745404?lpos=Business_First_Buisness_Feature_Teaser_Region__0&lid=ARTICLE_15745404_Protester_Who_Bricked_Up_Barclays_Bank_Wants_More_Help_From_Tycoons_To_Help_Turn_Economy_Around
This was taken from the sky news website about a 'property developer' that in protest about being refused a loan built a brick wall in front of the branch doors involved in protest at the banks 'we own' refusing him a loan. The article makes reference to his anger at HSBC as well in relation to their chairman receiving a pay off for services rendered.
My annoyance for this stems on many different levels. Firstly, he's a property developer, who purchases buildings when prices are low then sells them at a higher rate when the market recovers. On what, moral authority does someone that profits from the economy have on lecturing a CEO on their payouts? secondly, the Bank targeted was Barclays, which did take no state funding and made a public stance that they were one of few banks to receive no state financing. So while trying to make a brazen point about the banks we own, he comes off looking like a complete tit. Finally, his ire again states the mistaken belief that all 'banking staff' are on massive bonuses while the rest of the public should rise up against them. If anyone has been to my local branch, they can happily guarantee there is no employee carpark where we all keep our Aston Martins or Lambo's to drive home at night. In short, I'm not on a million pound bonus despite my best efforts and while this is probably more directed at news organizations directly, wish this would be reported. In effect, his actions have been sensationalised where he has effectively barricaded the branch staff in who were acting prudently in not lending to an individual who only wanted to add to his property portfolio and get richer off someone desperate for a flat.I have absolutely no pity for this individual who would target a branch because its convenient, if you feel emotional about banks, fees, bonuses etc by all means go chain yourself outside their headquarters in the Docklands or The City, of course you'll probably be shot by anti-terror police who mistake your actions, but don't pop down to your local branch during the week and frighten the hell out of the staff within. This is without doubt the most laziest, half arsed forms of protest that fails on every level imaginable. | | |
| I watched for a few moments part of the Mass held in Scotland by the Pope. Specifically the coral response by the girls choir being led on a stage akin to a Bon Jovi concert as opposed to a thursday afternoon service. What specifically caught my attention was the atire of the girls choir. While 'Last Night of the Proms' is a unique event in of itself with St. Georges flags flying in the Royal Albert Hall traditionally the singers? choiresters? are adourned in fairly conservative atire, suits for the gentlemen, dresses for the ladies. And while the young ladies of the Scottish choir were similarly dressed in smart suits they wore what can only be described as a tartan sash to highlight their 'Scottishness'. I get, national pride, I'll happily wear my American Converse and USA t-shirts to highlight my yanky roots despite being born and raised in England all my life, but I just couldn't understand the need to wear clothing to promote your nationality when it comes to singing. Call me a romanticist or traditionalist but I've always held the view when it comes to the arts be it the written word, the visual form or musical composition it really should be a medium that transcends nationalities and borders, a practise where you shouldn't have to emphasise your nationality such as these girls did on the Pope's visit. Religion again I would imagine without moving away from the subject matter, is a practise I believe would flourish if nationality could be removed, the ideas of 'the west' declaring war against Islam, or 'Muslim's attacking America/The UK' where the Religion's title replaces a country or specific threat. To a degree what I saw of this mass had no specific national reminders on display, I didn't see the Scottish flag, the Union Flag or indeed any national indicator to suggest this was anything but a religious event celebrating the arrival of the Popes visit in the UK. So then why the need to remind us with the tartan sash? or to put it in a differet context, this service could have been a service anywhere in the world without that Scottish reminder. Would a visit of the Pope to Switzerland result in big boobed, blonde girls in lederhosen singing Amen? would you find men with pressed white shirts and shorts and sandals during the Pope's tour of Australia? illuminated robotic suits during his tour of Japan? music is music, art is art, no one country can claim ownership over this medium and I just don't feel shoe horning a reminder into a presentation such as this was of good taste.
On a slight tangent the televised concert did suffer from 'beautiful people' syndrom, effectively pushing the clean skinned attractive members of the choir. I'm all for a pretty face and happily admit to being shallow in certain circumstances however as with the clothing, music again should transcend this need to present the medium in its purest form. I have this belief that the world had an oppurtunity when the Chinese were caught out during their Olympics with the 'attractive' child singer and the dubbed audio track from the 'unattractive' child singer being played over. Effectively, while they were criticised quite rightly you do have the feeling in effect they were just copying western sensibilities that all we can do is tolerate beautiful people and not accept art in its beauty can come from sources those we deem to be unattractive or off putting, and in a sense the edge of the artistic presentation can be eroded. Art speaks for itself as a visual medium, while I like certain dutch paintings I cannot for the life of me describe the artist or his appearance. And while your appreciation of the piece can be effected by outside stimulus, a noisy child at a museum, smells and odours drifting by, even thoughts on your mind, in general what you take from a work of visual art is what you can see and how your mind breaks down that information. Music, to me at least, while it can be taken through its purest sense by listening to it in isolation, I personally prefer the 'live experience', and in effect the live experience is the real experience. So when your presented this artificial picture of the 'perfect singers singing the perfect notes' its no more disturbing than the concept of Hitlers aryan race concept. If the Chinese were criticised for showing a beautiful voice and using a beautiful voice, but not from the same singer, why should we accept only atypical 'beautiful people' and by implication promote the concept that those deemed 'unbeautiful' cannot produce music or art worthy of our appreciation?
I don't quite understand how the Pope is effectively promoting the mandate of the Roman Catholic Church when he meets the Queen during his visit of the UK. Well by this my understanding is that it is an attemt to further cohesion between the Catholic church and the Anglican church in Britain. But there in lies my confusion, if this was simply a visit to a head of state I could perhaps understand the purpose however if this is a meeting of one religious 'head' to another, by my estimation thats effectively him accepting the female head of the Anglican church while the Catholic church continues to denounce female clergy? a woman can rule in the Anglican church but not practise? Perhaps this contradicts what I said about removing nationality from religious beliefs but if this is a meeting of religious leaders, based on that fundamental difference of practise I find it hard to accept how the Pope in good faith meet a female religious leader, its bizarre. | | |
| Today as part of my role within the bank I work in I conducted a bereavement appointment for an elderly lady whose partner had just passed away. I followed our normal procedures, nothing effectively above and beyond the call of duty besides a warm personality, and she was grateful for the time and consideration being put into her as a customer of our bank. Later on I was introduced and asked to assist a gentleman who was widowed with his accounts, to answer his enquires and make an appointment in the new year to provide assistance and guidance. Effectively, being asked to perform my job. Before we were due to close a student came in with her mum looking to increase her overdraft due to the loans finance fiasco that took place. While initially we could not immediately look to increase her overdraft I explained that there was an immediate appeals process for university students that could provide a temporary overdraft increase until her finances come in. And so we appealed the decision and she left with an increased overdraft, because I wanted to help her as an individual. Today when I got home I turned on my PC and read an article on Yahoo of all places, a blog effectively saying customers should 'ditch the high street bank' and turn to alternative forms of banking.
http://uk.biz.yahoo.com/11122009/389/ditch-bank.html
I have no special attachment to the company I work for, effectively I live by the motto everybody has bills to pay and unless you have lived the American dream a job is a job. But the popular opinion of all the cool kids right now is, to work in a retail bank ranks you just a little bit higher than a politician and a member of the BA cabin crew. But here's the thing, I am proud of what I do, despite being made to feel to the contrary but for a 'biz' article it does seem to suggest a person's sole interest in a bank is their rate of interest on their savings. And to some people this is there sole concern and as a banking group we are letting this demographic down. And I would quite happily advocate these same individuals to transfer their money to these online and association banking schemes but for the simple fact to do so would subject them to a first point of contact whose profession is not banking but grocery shopping or automobile repairs. Given todays example of an individual I saw, if her money had been invested in the AA, and she wanted to speak to an employee in person to discuss her circumstance, should she have rung for breakdown cover? an optional extra? flagged down a yellow lorry on the side of the road?. If your money was invested in Tesco, would you go to a cashier scanning vegetables for assistance in your finances?
Having studied Economics for 3 years I have every belief the market should act freely to an extent but this form of diversification of firms growing beyond their original target market, in the case of Tesco looking to expand beyond grocery shopping into, well, everything does worry me slightly. These advertised rates are just that, hooks to get money across and to its credit, I have heard they are launching in store 'mini banks' within 5 chains however, does that mean an individual has to travel hundreds of miles to see a Tesco Banker? as far as I am aware the AA offer no personal banking service. And I wouldn't bother ringing to have your tyre changed then asking your friendly AA road side assistant if he can look at increasing your overdraft. My point is, these companies offer fantastic rates at this moment in time, while its lucrative to target the high street banks given the bad press around them. And there will no doubt be stories of bad service experienced in retail banking branches, but today, on any given day, I helped 3 individuals out as this was my job, within a retail bank. Right now its fashionable to bash a banker, but every day I go into work with the honest intention to help those that I see not swindle your hard earned pounds and twirl my villains mustache. Today reminded me just what it was I enjoy about my role within the banking industry, 3 people leaving the branch with the impression that guy was invested in my concern, that guy helped me out. Idealistic? another day at the bank. | | |
| A list of things I didn't want to happen in London today but did:
1) Being bombarded then guilt tripped by the charity collector on the street. I can understand they need the extra money to fund their university studies, as nearly every one I see tends to be in their early 20's with that look in their eyes of being out of bed far to early than is humanly possible. But I worked part time through out my degree course, and not once had to resort to going onto the street harassing shoppers enjoying their solitary day off. Ordinarily I can shrug this off and pretend they don't exist but the poor girl had a 20 meter clear gap where she made eye contact with me, first mistake, secondly she turned on the smile and charm offensive. People who say girls don't deliberately flaunt 'it' to get what they want tell as much truth as a politician. Then amazingly as I passed her she proceeded to guilt trip me for not stopping to talk to her by saying 'all I said was I hope you have a nice day'. A sentence in itself that may make you pause for thought but the fact was if I had stopped to reply to her, on any way, shape or form I would have been bombarded with information about children in africa having a bad day, the world ending through climate change or whatever it was she was peddling. I just didn't need it today, the fake charm offensive and the guilt trip.
2) Gypsy Rose sellers, scum, they come up and push a flower towards you, not the whole flower and stalk just the flowers head rapped in tin foil then beg for money. I was by myself, on a grey rainy day in London, what on Earth would make them think I would want a crappy rose they probably stole in the first place, wrapped in tin foil for? to stick in my lapel and create the air of professionalism with a crappy rose in my coat? people say that if you buy drugs you fund terrorism and human trafficing. I say if your stupid enough to give money to these people your paying for their petrol to drive their caravan fleet down to your local park then proceed to vandalize and destroy the local area before moving on.
3) I don't want a leaflet to see Ripley's sodding, believe it or not. It may be all the big new fancy show in the capital but within a 5 minute walk of Picadilly Circus you are bombarded with at least a dozen individuals in big red coats throwing leaflets at you to come to their amazingly new attraction. The simple truth is, if I want to look at freaks, I can go on google and type in the word 'freak' and be subjected to a worldwide array of freaks of numerous description from midgits to giants and everything in between. What freakish abnormalities do we have in this country that warrant a whole museum dedicated to their freakiness? the countries largest tea bag? does Simon Cowell stand idly by as an attraction in the museum when he's not judging music contests? Yoko Ono? what do we have in this country that could entertain a family for a whole afternoon?. In short, its an inappropriate attraction in the hub of the nations capital, something I have no intention in visiting but should the need for a plentiful supply of free toilet paper arise, you know where to go.
4) Phone cards, I'm walking along and talking on my iPhone, a contract phone, a phone that I pay on a monthly basis to have the use of. What makes the brains of these people tick that I therefor want anything to do with their dodgy phone companies and their cards they give out? has anyone ever, actually registered with these companies to call India for 2p a minute or Iraq for 7p a second? and its always obscure countries they make an effort to highlight that it will be cheaper to connect to. Do they get monitored for the amount of cards they hand out? does some telephone nazi hide in the local KFC and clock the number given to the great and good? all I ever see about 5 meters after passing a phone card person is a pile of phone cards people have just dumped after realising the rubbish pushed into their hands. Then invariably you carry on and see a rubbish bin in a side alley overflowing with these cards when they just get bored and dump them and clock off for the day. If I was that desperate for cash I'd take the alternative and go around sticking up naked pictures of girls in phone boxes, it may be a grimy, cash in hand sorta work, probably illegal but at least you'd be staring at boobies instead of IndiaCom, the sub continents fastest growing telephone scam network.
5) As a nation we love to que, we understand que etiquette, you wait patiently until its your turn, whether your happy or not and then proceed to be served in your chosen field. Today I joined the que, thankful there was just one person in front of me. It was a fairly long transaction undertaken by someone returning books but I was happy, I had travelled all the way into London to collect my order. So imagine my surprise when a minute later a girl starts to hover beside me. She's cute in a posh, London sort of way, daddy probably runs a clinic for vagina surgery, mummies an alcoholic enjoying the benefits of the builder at their Mayfair abode. I was content to enjoy the association factor of having this girl beside me however, she started to complain she was actually next in the que, not me, that she had walked away to get a book and had returned to find 'me' standing in her place. A que is a que, you leave the que and you are no longer in the que. I could understand her complain to an extent if it was the length of the shop, but all it meant was having to wait for me to proceed but no. She pushed in front then approached the waiting assistant who looked rather sheepishly at me. Perhaps it is a common event? perhaps all girls in central London with a modicum of beauty are this arrogant but Christ almighty did she deserve a punch in the baby maker. | | |
| I switched on the news today, and was delighted to discover that the average banker will be taking home on average, a bonus payment this year of around £40k for performances in the last economic year. Great I thought, for my average performance this year I will have earned 2 years salary. Except its not true, and this figure of course relates entirely to the 'city bankers', investment bankers who are due to receive large financial bonuses. Of course this doesn't make a blind bit of difference to the customer who, having gone over drawn 'through no fault of their own' will come in to complain and subsequently accuse us, the 'bank' of not caring about his/her situation because we are all living the life of riley on our excessive bonuses which brought this country to its knee's. And at this point a general state of apathy will occur from us to them because as always, at this point in time we are viewed with nothing more than contempt by the people of this country for a service we provide. Working in your high street bank we are all well aware of the feelings from the general public in relation to bonus payments, the bonus in relation to performance is a part of our financial payment for services rendered. But this feeling of anger seems to overwhelm the view point that your 'average' entry level cashier will come in on a salary grade well below the national average, generally speaking anywhere between 13 - 17k. Now this may sound, to some, like a comfortable level to live off but the fact stands that in employment right now, I am probably only bringing in about £100 more than someone with 2 kids with child benefit and unemployment payments. If I were to suddenly become unemployed tomorrow my standard of living would not be drastically altered from what it is now. I dream of one day owning an Aston Martin DB9 through hard work and determination but the fact remains, I am content with my 1994 Nissan Micra, its what I can afford to run within my monthly budget. My bonus payment last month was entirely taken up by the 20% tax rate imposed by this labour government for anyone earning about £6k. Every single penny, I wasn't in a position to go out and buy the latest sports car or drink Crystal Champagne, I had to pay my tax then face the next working day with another complaint in relation to charges and once more be accused of living this luxurious lifestyle at the tax payers expense. Not every single customer I see on a daily basis accuses me of this practice, to which I would say not every single banker will pass you on the road in a quarter of a million pound sports car. But as long as the general consensus is that all bankers are living in this fictional world of high bonus payments at the expense of the tax payer, so this level of resentment will continue to simmer.
And what about the sheer hypocrisy of this anger? do we complain about nurses scraping by when doctors on 6 figure salaries make mistakes with the inevitable phrase 'lessons will be learned' while their children go on to private school? do we blame nurses for the mistakes of this higher up on substantially greater incomes? No, we don't, we praise those doing the 'real work' on the ground level. Did we blame the cashier staff in Woolworths for the management faults of the company before they went into administration? no, we felt sorrow for the loss of jobs that resulted from the down turn in the economy. In the United Kingdom, we have a proud tradition of effectively routing for the under dog in the face of adversity, championing those who for little or no reward do the jobs others are loathe to do. I'm not supporting the practice of Investment Bankers, through their actions we have arrived at this point our economical cycle all I would say is, the next time you have defaulted on your charges or loan payments, spare a thought at the branch member of staff who was probably earning less than you before tarring us with this brush of 'bonus payment culture'. I'll happily sit back, raise my hands when my monthly income is the same as these characters in the city of London. But for now I'm earning a very basic salary, this mythical 'bonus payment' is beyond my means and on a day to day basis being accused of ruining this country. As a branch cashier, its amazing the perceived levels of power we weld over the economies of the world. To a degree its about responsibility but then to an equal extent its also the blame culture. The media could have, from the start, been clear it was the investment banking side of the operations that caused this down turn when the story came out. But that's not headline worthy. So instead it was entire banking institutions, RBS, HBOS, Lloyds, high street names the general public could point to and assign blame for the current financial situation. I, as a member of a named high street bank are therefore liable for a certain amount of criticism and anger when unemployment or redundancies come to pass as a result of banking practice. When HRSA, the hospital Superbug came to pass the media presented this viewpoint that all hospitals were no more hygienic than a petting farm however through experience that was not the case, but hospital's were to blame, and by default the entire health profession had to accept the blame and anger of patients for the actions of a few bad departments.
If there is a solution to this situation its beyond my pay grade. And the uncomfortable truth is, when the next talking point news story occurs, the spot light will shift to that sector. The next hospital scandal, police brutality story, transport strike. But I don't blame the lady from church who works in the local hospital, I don't blame my sister for the 'institutionalized racism' within the police force even though she works for them. And I don't blame my local post man who does a damn fine job despite the actions of the union leaders whipping up this anger in their ranks. It comes down to people refusing to accept responsibility for their actions, and when this occurs the so called 'blame game' of fault takes place. The 'banking sector' got the economy into this mess is the general consensus felt by the general public, therefore as an employee within the banking sector I must take a measure of blame for this. Despite in no way shape or form having anything to do with investment banking. Then when the next sensational news event strikes the banking industry will be left tarred with this image of malpractice and incompetence, and carry on providing a financial service to this country. | | |
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