Last Friday, I went to the bank like I always do on The
Husband’s payday to pull out the money to fill our envelopes. This week I was
filling all my envelopes, not just cash and gas so it was a rather hefty sum in
multiple denominations: fifties, twenties, tens, and fives.
Well, I went up to the teller, like normal with my
withdrawal form and my post-it note. (I always have a post-it note that has a
denominations break-down of how I want the money.) After she pulled up my
account, she asked me how I wanted my money. I told her X amount of fifties, X
amount of twenties, X amount of tens, and X amount of fives. I then asked her
if it added up right. She said it did.
She pulled all the money out of her drawer and then started
to count it back to me. As she was counting, when she got near the end, she
kind of stuttered over the numbers. I noticed but honestly didn’t think much of
it.
I took the money, set it in my wallet and headed to my car.
It was only when I got to my next destination and had a few minutes to spare
that I started to actually fill my envelopes. Needless to say, I ran out of
money before I ran out of envelopes.
I counted my money again and again. I double and triple
checked my already filled envelopes. I added and counted the totals on my
post-it note. I checked the numbers on my spreadsheet. Anyway I cut it, I was
$100 short.
I finished the errands I had to run and then called the
bank. I was on hold for about 8 minutes and on my way home when I decided to go
to the bank to get this figured out. By the time I got to the bank, I’d been on
hold about 13 minutes. I stayed in line at the bank for another 7 minutes,
still on hold, before I was helped by the teller. It was a different teller
than had helped me earlier. The first thing I told her was that I had been on
hold for 20 minutes and no one had ever helped me or even asked me to continue
holding. (To me, it was apparent that they just figured someone would wait and
give up!) All she said to me was, “It’s Friday and we’re really busy”.
I proceeded to explain to her that I had a very unique
situation. I told her I had come to the bank earlier and that I had taken out
some money and that I thought I was shorted $100. I told her who helped me and
about what time I had come in. (The lady that helped me originally was still
there, but not at her counter and was helping another customer.) The feeling
that I got from the new teller helping me was that while she believed I was
short $100, she was pretty sure I made a mistake somewhere. She was nice to me,
but she just gave off a vibe of “we don’t make mistakes like that, you must
have miscounted”. Nevertheless, she took my name, account number, and telephone
number and told me that my original teller would contact me later that evening
once she’d balanced her drawer, “if she was off”.
I left discouraged, but I also felt like I had done
everything I could do.
Fast forward just a short while later and my cell phone
rings. It was my original teller calling me to apologize and tell me that, yes,
she had shorted me $100.
I was so happy and felt such a flood of relief. What I’m the
most happy about is the fact that it was resolved so quickly. I really
appreciate that she called me and told me so fast! She told me, “sorry, and we
have your money here for you”. At this point, I had been to the bank twice
already (and on hold with them for 20 minutes) and didn’t fancy a third trip so
I asked her to just deposit it back into my account. Which she promptly did.
I was able to “borrow” $100 from our car repair envelope
until I am able to get to the bank and replace the money. All my envelopes have
the correct amount of money in them and so does my bank account… now.
In the grand scheme, it was “only” $100, but in my current
reality, it was $100!!! I’m working really hard to dig out of debt so I wasn’t
really looking forward to losing $100 to my bank. I’m so glad it was resolved
so quickly and I don’t have to worry about not being believed, (which was
probably my biggest worry!).
That’s a long story for “just” $100!
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