The godly woman

So, when I was with the bank, I had my share of strange calls, but I think this one was the strangest.

A woman called in to ask if her husband, who was now in New York, could open an ordinary savings account with the Singapore branch of the bank. I said sure, but he would need to go down to a branch as we would need to photocopy his identification documents and his signature.

This lady then informed me that her husband would not be in Singapore for a while. So I asked if her husband was a Singaporean, and she said yes, so I advised her of this one type of savings account the bank had which could be applied for via a mailed in application or through the internet. However, this account would not have the usual passbook and atm card things.

This lady was quite excited at first, but then she became disappointed because she said her husband needed the passbook and atm card things. I regretfully informed her that in such a case, her husband would need to go down to a bank branch. She asked if she could do it on behalf of her husband and I said that that was against regulations and we would need the potential account holder to go down personally.

So the lady sighed and asked if I was sure and I said yes, I was very sure, and she began telling me of her family problems for some reason. Apparently, her husband owes the bank some money, and so he didn't dare to come back to Singapore. It was a large sum of money - no I won't tell you exactly how much but it's definitely 7 figures! - and it was not money that he personally owed to the bank but he had been the guarantor for his brother's business which collapsed and now the brother had run away, leaving her husband to shoulder the loan by himself and her husband just couldn't because her husband's business had also collapsed and now what were they to do?

I could only make sympathetic noises. I mean, under the circumstances, what could I possibly say??

And she continued saying that she had actually sold her house to help her brother-in-law and had given him all the proceeds from the sale of the house and asked him to pay off his loan BUT her brother-in-law had taken all the money and run!

I made a shocked noise and decided to listen as I reckoned she just needed a sympathetic ear for a bit, and she would later hang up. I continued squirming though, because...wasn't this kinda...personal and private? It was one of the most uncomfortable, made-me-feel-like-shit-about-my-job calls I've ever had.

The lady then continued speaking: now her husband owed the bank so much money and had no choice but to run away and he was so scared to come back and that's why he needed a bank account with an atm card so that he could draw money out to use while overseas and the bank was so heartless because even though they couldn't find her husband, they were still charging interest every single day and they didn't have any heart at all, some more interest was so high they were like loan sharks but worse and she then demanded why why why the Government - when she said government, I really saw it like that with a capital G and by the way, she really speaks without stop that's why there's no punctuation! - didn't catch the bankers because the bankers were such bad people and that GOD - with trumpets and loud drums- would take care of them and that she was going to talk to GOD about it.

I then gulped and said um, well, I'm sure but you know madam if you just um, could persuade your husband to come back, I'm sure he and the bank can work things out in a way that could help both your husband and the bank.....

The lady jumped in again with a no use lah, the bankers are all so heartless, even though they earn so much money and she was sure they would get retribution and she said that maybe she should talk to Lee Kuan Yew to do something about it and then she seemed to think better of that and said no she thinks even Lee Kuan Yew can't do anything and that it would be better to talk to God and she then kindly said that she wasn't talking about poor folks like us who only earn so little but still have to do the bankers' dirty work. She was talking about the evil people who earned so much and still wanted to bully the common folks who were just trying to eke out a living and she just knew that God would punish them, she was going to talk to God and leave everything to him.

By this time I was of course gaping like a fish and could already repeat my line about please persuade your husband to come back and work things out instead of running away. The lady was of course, off and running like a train and had no ear for my words anymore, which I have to admit were pretty weak against her hard-luck story. To tell the truth, I thought this kind of things only happen in movies, and television shows...

I quickly pressed the mute button and was frantically gesturing to my manager because obviously the conversation was already beyond my control. My manager made a one-minute-please gesture to me, and I was like come-over-right-now-please-oh-please look to her, so she leisurely sauntered over and I began telling her that there was this woman ranting on the phone and I had tried my best but I didn't know how on earth I could control the situation anymore.

In the meanwhile, the woman was growing more agitated and suddenly she said thank you so much ah miss for listening to me but now I must go and talk to God, but thank you so much and then HUNG UP.

And I was left listening to a dial tone. My manager could only laugh after I told her what happened.