A bit of cynicism never hurt

I hate to sound like a cynic (well, maybe I don't really care), but I learned a long time ago that if someone can take advantage of you -- they probably will. Of course, this doesn't always apply to the people you have close personal relationships with - family, friends, etc. However, it most likely applies to the corporations and individuals that you do business with on a daily basis, including your employer.

Now, this does not mean that the world is against you and that you should retreat to a fallout shelter in your backyard and live on dead squirrels. It just means that you should be looking out for your own financial well being and should not expect anyone else to care about it as much as you do.

With that being said, this blog is about the little things that companies try to get away with on a daily basis that may not have an immediate impact on your net worth, but over time they could add up to something meaningful.

Let me give you some examples.

A few months ago, my boyfriend deposited a check in the ATM at his bank (without naming names, let's call it "Shitty Bank"). The check was for something like $24.07. After a few days, he noticed online that the deposit amount was for $24.00. It took a few irritating phone calls and some arguments with offshore call centers, but eventually the "error" was corrected and the .07 was credited to his account. At first glance, it seems like a waste of time and energy to even bother with $0.07, but THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT BANKS ARE COUNTING ON. If a bank has several million customers, and they steal $0.07 from just 1M of them in a single day, that adds up to $70,000. If they do this once a week for a year (to a different set of customers), that adds up $3,640,000. I don't know about you, but I would be pretty happy to have an extra $3.6M lying around. The moral of the story - it's worth the energy expended just for the sheer principle.

Another example is with my credit card company and their lovely annual fee. I recently changed from one credit card reward program to another (I plan on writing a lot about these so-called "reward programs" -- in due time), and was assured that my new card had no annual fee. After a month, a $30 annual fee appeared on my card. My first phone call to the credit card company resulted in a promise of a credit. After waiting several weeks, I decided to pay the $30 because I am anal and obsessive and was concerned that a lack of payment may end up reflecting on my pristine credit report. However, now I was pissed. During my second phone call, I was told that there was no record of my first call, but they did assure me once again that the fee would be credited. Once the next statement arrived (online, of course), I noticed a $25.00 credit for the annual fee. However, if you recall, I had paid $30.00. I won't bore you with any more boring details, but just know that it took several more phone calls before the additional $5.00 was finally credited. You can do the math and figure out how much $5.00 per customer is worth. Once again, the moral of the story is that the time spent fighting for my lousy $5.00 was worth it on principle. The more people fight for what is theirs, the less companies would even attempt to get away with such nonsense.

I can go on and on about other examples of companies attempting to take advantage of you and hoping you don't notice, but whining gets old quickly. This does, however, lead me to my next blog, which will be about tracking your finances. It's the single most important thing you can do for your net worth.

Until then, stay cynical and fight for your own money.