Technology... Technology... Technology...!! Oh, how wonderful it has been! After all, we all enjoy the fact that we don't have to look forward to a physical bank office location being open and rather have these tiny boxes all over the roads and complexes, of various hues and sizes, dispensing cash, if we had it in our accounts that is, all through the day! The never ending rush and lines at payment counters for the utility bills are definitely a thing of past now, with the money making its way out of the accounts for several reasons - all over the wire again, little to do in terms of physical presence or geographic locations. Sometimes, technology can go real far beyond its limited roles of advancing and easing our lifestyles to remind us who we truly are - social creatures. In this blog post, I am going to talk about one such an experience I had.
During the end of week of the 14th August, I suddenly heard this murmur in my mind... "Ravi, start taking control... you are way long out of it". Control? But.. hmm.. er... of what? "Food, of course! You have been eating as if there is no tomorrow. Your stomach can probably digest off... I am not able to... You have been checking in at every other corner side restaurant all over the place..." Oh well, this is something sane. I cannot take to any sane advise easily! "Alright... listen carefully, how about you start reviewing your accounts at least? Do you even know what's going on with them... You have been way too much a consumerist... think about it!" OKAY! This sounds somewhat reasonable. But where do I begin? "Why not with the upcoming payment dues?" OKAY!
A perfect weekend night when I should've probably been humming and reminded of the Highwayman, an upcoming energy bill payment came to my mind. Oh well, I think I got the starting point..!! I will pay them a good two days in advance through my credit cards and retain my cash balance! Can there be a better way than a mirage of a higher bank balance as a perfect place to start feeling things are being brought under control? :D
Everything seemed good now. Credit card payments don't come due until a particular point in the month. And I am going to be lucky having to see extra money lingering in my accounts until then! Two days passed. The actual date of the electric and gas bill due came in. And its from that point that I would begin to realize how technology can have far reaching implications on anything that I would've ever known..! Thanks to my sense of starting to take tighter control, I was happily trying to move away from using my credit cards for some of my normal purchases and started to use cash. And invariably, there were places that definitely had better deals for cash payments as opposed to credit payments too. Wow! What a discovery!
Well.. not exactly I realized, until the time that my energy company deemed it fit to go ahead with the automated payment setup on my account regardless of the payment I already made. Well, so what? It should now be a $0 payment right? How can systems be designed to send over a $0 payment deduction? Come on, there should be something in "the design". Well yeah, logically! If not, someone should've definitely caught and found this - after all, who is to really validate and test the design?Alright, its becoming increasingly hard these days to talk about something without getting references back to work! Apologize for that.
So, what's the big deal? Well - the payment actually got deducted. Alright, what's the deal again? Just get that reversed? Now came the shocker to me... my energy company apparently prepares the "draft of folks" whose account needs to be automatically deducted for balance due. And this goes out just the two days before the actual due dates. OKAY. So what? They cannot "reverse" and had to send me a cheque.
Alright, here is what happened.... I got stranded with a mobile that went out of charge in the Journal Square Station of PATH. I had to travel to Seacaucus Junction. Train services had already kicked into the weekend schedules and my travel back to the 33rd Street was out of question with the weekend maintenance that seemed to have kicked in. Exhausted and still having to go for a good 30 miles before I can get to hit my place of stay for the rest of the night, I was definitely looking at the fastet choice to get to Seacaucus Junction, where I had parked my car.
Alright, now these are usual commutes that most people do. And we are talking about cities that literally don't sleep. What's the big deal? Well... the deal is, I had to take a taxi... and taking it meant having cash on hand. I head to the ATM at the junction to withdraw cash and I was thrown an alert that I had to overdraw my account if I chose to pull cash (thanks to the energy company episode). I tried keying in a smaller amount and the same thing happened. Oh yeah, that phenomenal third try... and the big LOCKOUT happens with the message asking to call and confirm to release my ATM debit card since "fraudulent activity was suspected". Fair enough!
Now, none of this is going to change the situation I had to deal with. I still need a way to get to Seacaucas. With still needing a way to get out to Seacaucus junction and having a switched off phone, my mind was racing quickly on what should I do. After some thought post walking up and down at the entrance of the station, I figured out I might as well ask the taxi if he would accept credit cards and if technology can rescue me somehow. "Credit cards? No Sir, sorry!" With a shut off phone and a shut off bank account as well (though it apparently didn't have the money I was requesting for, I could've at least incurred the wrath of fees considering the situation), I decided to give explaining my situation to the taxi driver a shot. He gave a patient listening to me and said, "Well.. I can do something for you my friend... If you can get my tank filled to the same amount as the travel to Seacaucus would take, I am good". Aaah..! What a big relief. Good old barter system! I definitely had all of the technology failures here to ultimately thank for the human connect built at 2:30 AM on a warm and sultry Saturday morning in a populous and bustling city, with a taxi driver whom I do not know if I might cross paths with again!
