"Kindly machine-gun the choir!"

[chaletian]

I had a letter today from my bank. Well, not today, obviously. It's Sunday. It came on Thursday, I think, but I didn't get around to opening it till today. I get quite a lot of unexpected post from my bank, which always worries me, because I think I've got into banking trouble (even when I know perfectly well that there's nothing wrong with my account).

But anyway, my post today was offering me a £12,500 loan. This loan is, apparently, "ready and waiting just for [me]", because I am "a loyal customer who handles their account particularly well". The bank has "arranged everything": "all it takes is one phone call". They have been at particular pains to point out how easy it would be for me to get this £12,500 loan. How straightforward it would be.

I think this is absolutely appalling. How cavalier are they, to offer this sort of thing to any passing customer? I am *dreadful* with money. I mean, I'm not too bad these days. I have a regular income, which helps, and I budget regularly, and I tend to know exactly how much money I have in my bank account. But I still sometimes make stupid financial decisions, and in the past I have been absolutely unreliable, and frankly it's a miracle I managed to escape my late teens/early twenties without a CCJ. Offers like this make me feel quite threatened, really, because (after the annoyance of more junk mail) my first reaction is, ooh, lovely money, before the voice of reason takes over, but that reaction scares me a lot, because I don't want to be as crap with money as I used to be. Wah. I hate money.

Comments

[donna-k.livejournal.com]

My bank once wrote to me to tell me they had just upped my overdraft limit fromn £250 to £2500, which annoyed me intensely, because if I'd wanted an overdraft that big, I'd have asked for one. And they *knew* I was bad with money, because at the time I still had a £2000 overdraft on my student account with the same bank. I had to go into the branch and force them to reduce it back to the original amount. Banks are just stupid, they just throw credit at anybody without thinking of the consequences. Except when I actually wanted a loan from them to pay off my credit card, I couldn't have that for some reason. Bah!