A Farce With A Cash Machine
On the 18th of October, I tried to draw £50 out of cash machine inside the Nationwide branch at Upper Street in Islington. I tried twice and this was in front of the nose of someone senior in the branch, who watched everything I did, as I complained to him about the slowness of the machine. In the end I got fed up, so I went and did my shopping and then got the money a few minutes later.
When I checked my statement, the next day, not £50, but £150 had been withdrawn from my account. As I was in Leeds that day, I reported it in their branch there.
It is now the 25th and I still haven’t had my money returned. Yesterday, I was virtually accused of doing something wrong, by the person in the branch. So I stormed out, vowing to move my account. I probably won’t as all I need is a simple money transfer system to pay bills.
But it does seem to be taking a long time to sort out a problem, that happened under the nose of one of the branch’s senior employees! The last tine this happened to me it was at an ATM owned by Santander. The money was put back in my account by the next day.
The sum involved is not everything to me, but I am a widow and to some in my circumstances, that £100 would be very important.
Zopa in the Sunday Times
Zopa is featured in an article in the Sunday Times today called “Become a Lender and Earn 15 %”.
Two statements about Zopa stand-out.
Zopa has provided £160m-worth of unsecured loans to consumers since it was launched in 2005 and accounts for more than 2% of such new lending.
If that is true, then they have become a significant player in the personal lending market. I checked with Zopa and they told me that it’s between one and two percent and sometimes up to the higher limit.
And.
Zopa said its default rate is 0.9% against an average 5% to 7% for high street banks.
I would go along with that as my default rate has not been at all high. In fact it’s significantly less than 0.9%.
The Zopa Login
Adnmittedly, I know the people at Zopa well, but is there a financial site, that has such a simple, foolproof and I think secure, login. All you need to remember is your e-mail address and password and know the answers to a set of personal questions, whose answers, most people would know about themselves.
So what would happen if you someone broke my login? They might find out how much I had invested, but they wouldn’t be able to withdraw any money without first setting up a link to their bank account and then authorising the link. Not something that is easily done without leaving a trail of evidence. I suspect too, that alarms would ring at Zopa.
Everybody, who designs a secure login could do no better, than build on the excellent work Zopa has done.
Zopa and a Transaction Tax
One of the great things about Zopa is that the only tax you pay is income tax on any money you earn.
I hope that the EU’s proposed new transaction tax, doesn’t sneak in there somewhere. After all, politicians would love to find a way to tax us more, so how about 0.01% of every transaction going through the banking system? It would be a total loser, as even at a very low amount, the man on the Dalston Omnibus would object strongly to paying a tax on every time he received or paid-out money.
I suspect it won’t happen, but the Euro was badly set up and although it is a very good idea, you can’t really expect all countries to adopt a legal approach, when they see a clever loophole.
But Zopa does mean that you avoid stamp duty on an investment, which like the Stock Market, has a degree of risk.
Milliband To Pledge To End “Fast Buck” Culture
According to this report, Milliband is going to pledge to end the “fast buck” culture.
Ed Miliband will vow to end Britain’s “fast-buck” culture and ensure the “right people” are rewarded, in a speech to Labour’s annual conference.
The Labour leader will say later that the country needs “a new bargain based on a different set of values”.
Unfortunately, the get rich quick ideas have always been with us at all levels of society. As an example, the only shop I can see from my house is a betting shop. If I go down Dalston High Street, it is a sea of similar shops and pay-day loan companies. And look at the success of those legalised loan-sharks, Wonga.
In fact, it will be much easier to curb, the “fast buck” culture in the City, as many responsible people I know, steer well clear of the more dodgy practices that brought us some of the very high risk financial instruments, that took a lot of banks to their knees. It used to be in the city, that when you invested in Lloyds and similar companies, if it all went wrong you lost everything. Consequently, the risk management was a lot better, proving Dr. Johnson totally right about hanging.
Incidentally, I was urged to join Lloyds and didn’t! Why? Because it’s my money and I like to have some slight control over what happens to it.
Thinking after what I have just written about Lloyds, wouldn’t it have been better to have put the various bad banks like HBOS and Bank of Scotland into receivership, rather than use them to poison Lloyds TSB. After all, they were very much a victim of Milliband’s “fast buck” culture. But NuLabor made the mistake of saving them. And who was at the centre of that process?
The New Greek Bailout
Greece is the Pakistan of Europe.
It is corrupt, totally resistant to change and bankrupt in both a financial and moral sense. And as I pointed out earlier, they can’t even spell tax.
When a company goes bust, you put in administrators to see if they can sort out the mess.
Where are the administrators for Greece?
Let’s face it, I’m sure Disney could make a better job of running the Parthenon!
The Greeks Can’t Spell Tax
Just heard David Bewick of BGC Partners on BBC Radio 5.
He said the above in a rather far-reaching appraisal of the economic state of the world.
He said two other points of note.
- The Greeks have no commerce or manufacturing of note.
- When did you last hear a profits warning, from a company that wasn’t a bank?
It was all very entertaining.
I’ll add some good news of my own. In July, I earned 5.88% before tax on the money I have in Zopa. In August, it was down to 5.40%. So what has been my return for the first 24 days of September? It’s back up to 5.88%! They always say about investments that they can go down as well as up.
Was It The Cat?
UBS has discovered some unauthorised trading according to this report.
I’ve heard some interesting stories.
In one a trader typed in the value he wanted to trade. He then went home and left the computer switched on, with the value still there. The cleaner then dusted his desk and accidentally did the trade.
Or that’s what they think happened. Luckily the guy who sorted it out made a profit on the deal.
In another incident, it was the cat that stepped on the keyboard. Or that was the explanation to explain the loss!
In both cases though the software should have picked up the inactivity and shut the computer down.
Two Pieces from the Zopa Newsletter
The monthly Zopa newsletter is always worth a read. There are some older ones here.
Two pieces from the current August one, I received yesterday are worthy of note.
This is the first.
And fresh off the press today, there is an interesting column in today’s Evening Standard, which states that (and we quote) “maybe a banker-free future will be with us sooner than we think”
I’ve been saying that about banks for a long time. Alternative methods will keep cropping up for their key services. On Tuesday, I went into Nationwide at Islington to use their cash machine and comfy chairs and the place had all the excitement of a morgue.
The second piece is about the people who work for Zopa.
Last but not least, we are very excited in the office as we launch NEED:LESS, our new fundraiser, and we’d love you to join us on our mission! Starting on Friday, 9th September, the Zopa team will be living on just £5 a day, for a week. This will have to cover all food, fun and extras, while the remaining amount that we would normally spend will be donated to DEC in support of the East Africa crisis.
How many of the fat cat bankers would know how to live on five pounds a day? Five pounds a minute perhaps!
Zopa’s New Login
Zopa has changed it’s login screen and as would be expected from a company which is based on innovative software, it has created one of the simplest and secure login systems that I have seen.
You login initially with a standard user name and password. You can check either or both of two boxes.
- Remember the user name on this computer.
- Show the characters I’ve typed into the password.
Many systems like eBay use the first, but few use the second, which is important to me, as my left hand is a bit wayward with the shift key.
They then ask you one of three check questions, such as where you were born. This question has always been case insensitive, which is the way it should be. If it’s not, you then might have to write it down, which of course breaks the security.
I can truthfully say though that I’ve never had any problems with logging in to Zopa. Or any security issues either.
The Anonymous Widower 