Well I'm still whinging, sorry. The main bank account that I've
used all my adult life has naturally come with a free card to use
at ATMs and EFTPOS terminals. I believe a Visa/MasterCard debit
card has always been an option for an extra fee, but I'm comitted
to paying for things in cash and not using accounts with a large
balance for online payments, so the free card worked fine for my
use almost entirely at one ATM. That also makes it easier to check
through bank statements for the card (which are mailed to me - no
trust for online banking here) and identify unauthorised
transactions, which of course don't happen due to how little the
account is exposed.
For in-store payments I always pay cash. For online I have a couple
of cards, one Visa and one MasterCard, onto which I put only enough
money for the purchase I intend to make, or I use PayPal where
that's available. Online, one of these three options has always
worked, although in some cases two failed (sometimes quite
inelegantly - phone calls involved) before I found out which one
that was, hence the two cards. Honestly I often feel like I'd kill
just to buy things from a store rather than deal with the horrors
of online payments which have haunted me for weeks in the past, but
on the other hand it does allow me to do things like buy the parts
for the Jag from the UK even though it turns out the Australian
parts place that I usually buy from closed down this year (without
bothering to announce the fact on their website, but timing-out
email server + two disconnected phone lines writes its own story).
Anyway the point of all this is that I keep those online-associated
things completely separate from all that latter stuff (different
banks even), nor am I interested in this new "Tap & Go" payment
thing which leaks your card details to the nearest RFID reader and
appears to attract all sorts of fees that aren't disclosed until
after you pay them. So the current ATM+EFTPOS card suits me
perfectly, which of course is why the bank has decided it's
obsolete and are withdrawing it in early January.
Cue hours spent trawling through tables and descriptions of account
fees and rebates to conclude that: a) I'll need to make them turn
off all the features that the new Debit MasterCard adds, plus keep
the card shielded from RFID readers because they can probably still
skim details even with Tap & Go disabled. b) Via layers of
monthly/yearly charges and subtracting partially-applicable
rebates, it'll cost me a minimum of $5.60 per year, and probably a
little more, compared to usually zero fees while I've had the
account so far. c) Changing to their newer transaction account type
would cost me more in other fees, even though the card would then
be free.
OK so $5.60+ per year isn't the end of the world, but I'm paying it
for _nothing_. I don't want any of the features, and in fact
they'll be more of a pain to turn off, and I now have extra fees to
watch because just one tweak regarding the rebates (which I'm not
confident I've interpreted correctly in the first place: the lady
at the bank and the letter announcing the change all gave me
different answers (letter = no monthly fees, lady = $3/month)) and
the figure could change completely, making it better to switch
account types.
I can't help but wonder about the future if my desires for systems
using a minimum of technology are this weird now while I'm in my
20s. I feel like I'm hypocritical being stubborn about these things
while spending much of my time working on technical aspects of
computers and electronics. But I like ATMs, 24/7 access to cash
withdrawals is a fine practical application of technology, why
can't I just keep that and not have to implicitly trust all this
other stuff that's less secure than my current arrangements? Or if
not, I still have to pay for it anyway.
Still, while hunting through all the account type terms, I did
notice that since interest rates have picked up my savings account
interest rate has been stuck down at about %0.35 interest while the
new accounts are now getting %3.5. Sneeky buggers, that account
type did have a decent interest rate when I set that account up,
they've just passed on the rate cuts and not the more recent rises
which have applied higher rates to their new accounts for the last
year or two. So in that regard this card fiasco worked out
financially beneficial for me overall, but only by pushing me to
wade through their T&C PDFs and crunch numbers for a while.
Oh and it's a public holiday today, but I'm not taking it because
on Wednesday I learnt (a day after most people apparantly, the
article I read started with something like "in case you've been
living under a rock for the last 24 hours" - apparantly I am
because that's not the first time I've had that) that Daniel
Andrews unexpectedly resigned as premier of the state! That's far
more reason to rejoice than some football thing that's on today, so
I took Wednesday off instead and now I'd better start work. Next
weekend I might be taking a day off for my rail holiday too
actually, but then the rain forecasts for late next week are making
it look like I'd be better off taking a boat than a train, so I'm
not sure.
