MY BLANKETY BLANK BANK—

I am beginning to have a love-hate relationship with my bank.

1) I have used their online bill paying service for several years now. This year, as usual, I paid my real estate taxes in plenty of time. Then, weeks after the due date, my bank statement arrived and I noticed a refund in the amount of my tax payment.

When I finally managed to chase this down, I was informed by local bank officials the outfit they farm this work out to does not handle tax payments. It didn’t matter that this had never been a problem for me in the past.

And there was certainly no sympathy that this egregious treatment had put me in a delinquent position with the folks in the court house. Fortunately, when I showed county officials the audit trail of this pathetic transaction they excused me with their own dicey remarks about modern banking.

2) The first time I ever used an ATM machine away from my bank’s area was in Port Clinton during one of my recent camping excursions. I cruised through a bank there and got 40 bucks from their magic machine. And, as expected, they dinged me 2 bucks for the privilege. I accept that.

But, when my bank statement arrived my bank also dinged me 2 bucks. And, I have been unable to pry anything resembling a logical explanation from bank officials for this larceny.

They have the benefit of my banking dollars and this transaction cost them absolutely nothing. Yet their bookkeeping theft compounded my fees to a whopping 10% of my tiny transaction.

3) In the next recent legal thievery I obtained an automobile loan to purchase my truck. And, instead of rewarding me for being a very prudent fellow and paying my loan off early, they insist on whacking me another $100 bucks as an early payment penalty should that occur.

Actually, that is highly likely to occur. I paid off more than half of the loan before my first monthly payment was due.

And this from the good folks at First-Knox National Bank, who blather the slogan “...Someone you can trust.”

Ha.