06 Jul Computer says no.

Recently, for five hours, we had no money at all.

This was just a little scary, especially given that the Onswitch wage run was about to start rolling.

Somehow we had managed to fluff the access procedure for our corporate online banking account, confusing the system so much that it locked down our account (we’re never ones to do things by halves!)

So we dutifully pick up the phone and ring the bank’s UnHelpdesk. Mercifully they did not tell us to turn our computer off and on again; otherwise there would have been some ‘losing it’ of serious proportions.

Especially as the voice at the other end of the line was job’s worth-ness personified.

Quite understandably, we had to be taken through security before our problem could be sorted. But there was no mother’s maiden name or favourite football team here – the security questions were very specifically related to recent transactions in the company account.

Now we’re guessing it’s not just us that doesn’t know EXACTLY what the last credit that went into our business account was? Or, to the penny, what the last payment to leave the account was? It’s a business account – money goes out of it all the time. Sometimes, if we’ve been very good, some even goes in.

So we failed the security process too. Which required us to point out that if we had been able to name all the precise details of recent transactions, then we would be either:

1. a) Rain man, or
2. b) LOOKING AT THE BLOODY ACCOUNT SUMMARY ON SCREEN ANYWAY.

And in neither case would we have required the ‘help’ of this unlucky young man.

The only thing for it, we were told, was to go into a branch with our passport.

This is not only a major irritation in an already packed working day, it is practically impossible. We bank with the Royal Bank of Scotland. The office is in Grantham.

Aaaaaargh.

Sometimes, even in matters of financial security, we all need to be able to by-pass ‘the system’. There are any number of other security questions that could have been asked, but the bank’s computer just happened to generate the only ones we couldn’t answer without access to our account. There was simply no option to bring up new security questions, no common-sense override, and no sense filter.

Just computer says no.

Which is just no good.