For reasons that shall forever escape my comprehension, Jill suddenly became convinced that the newly merged Chase Manhattan Bank was cheating her. After that, absolutely nothing I said could convince her otherwise. Not even when I said that I have been banking at Chase - formerly Chemical Bank - for twenty years, during which time the bank has never cheated me. Not even once. But Jill asks me how I can be so sure. She says it is extremely difficult to figure out if a bank is cheating you. So difficult, she says, that if one does cheat you, you might never know.

On the contrary, I assured her. Every time there has been a problem, I have always discovered that it was I who made the mistake. Never the bank. Jill does not believe this. She points out that she knows a lot about computers and that all computers make mistakes. And she has somehow become convinced that all the computers at Chase Manhattan Bank are out there making all the mistakes that computers make. And making them in her account. So that Chase Manhattan Bank was cheating her.

I am ashamed to admit that, during twenty years of banking, not once has it occurred to me that the computers might all be making mistakes and cheating me. In twenty years the possibility of error or fraud has never entered my mind; nor have I ever suspected my money to be at risk. Worse still, for twenty years I have foolishly been assuming my money to be safe! Whereas it has taken Jill just a year to suspect that it wasn't. I was astonished at my own naiveté. I was also embarrassed to have urged Jill to move her money to Chase so it could earn more interest than it did at Citibank. Where she had been keeping it for years. Safely.

And in fact, when Jill did open her account at Chemical and it earned lots of interest, I was feeling really good about my advice. But this was before it occurred to Jill that the bank might be cheating her.

At that point she knew that she had to do something immediately. She even knew precisely what she had to do. She had to examine every one of her Chemical Bank records which, much to her regret, she had neglected to look at for over a year. But now she was fully determined to review every piece of paper carefully and to uncover any possible evidence of fraud. No matter how cleverly concealed. So she asked to see all my records. Luckily I was able to find them and give them to her. And now, with my year's worth of records and her year's worth of receipts, she was going to see whether everything matched up.

I was at home painting later that night when the first call came. Jill's suspicions had been completely confirmed. "I have a deposit slip for $313.48 but there's no record of it anywhere in my savings account," she informed me. "And this is only the first month I've examined," she added gravely. "It's just like I thought it would be."

Even I had to admit that this sounded bad. In only the first month she had examined, Chemical Bank had managed to defraud her account of $313.48! I was beginning to wonder how I could possibly have recommended such an institution. I was sadly glancing over the records still in my possession, when I noticed something interesting. I looked very carefully. Then I looked again. "There seems to be a deposit for $313.48 in your checking account," I remarked cautiously. "Could that be what you're looking for?" "No," Jill said. "I deposited the money in my savings account." "Sometimes I mean to make a deposit in my savings account and I deposit it in my checking account by mistake," I told her. "Do you think this could have happened? I mean, the amounts are identical."

While Jill may be ditsy at times, she is always reasonable and fair. So with just the slightest hesitation, even she had to admit that, unlikely though it seemed, she just might have a mistake of this sort. So she relinquished her theory of fraud. In this one instance anyway. Reluctantly.

I was painting again when I was soon interrupted by a second call.

"This time it's really bad," Jill informed me. "There's a check missing for $745. I deposited it in March. Dad looked also and neither one of us can find it anywhere."

This did sound bad. A lot worse than before. A lot more money involved. A lot more money lost. I consulted my own records. Not a single trace of the $745. Not even in her checking account. This time it seemed as if she really could be right.

We decided that Jill should call the 800 number at once, then get back to me to let me know what happened. I was feeling bad all over again just thinking about her fears being confirmed.

I was surprised when the phone rang. It rang sooner than I had expected. And Jill was sounding positively cheerful. "Uhh. Dad says I shouldn't call you anymore," she announced sprightly. "Uhh. It seems that I must have put the wrong date on the deposit slip. I wrote March, but I guess I deposited it in April. I must have really been out of it," she added as if such an explanation somehow made this incident an exception. "But don't worry. I'm not going to call you anymore." And she hung up.

I called back, laughing. I was feeling a lot better now. I told her again how consistently honest I had found Chemical, now Chase, to be. But I added that, even though she was earning more money there, if she really wanted to, by all means she should switch back to Citibank.

"No," Jill said. "I want to stay at Chase." And she hung up. I knew she was still checking her records in order to be sure that Chase Manhattan was not stealing her money.

January, 1997
BB