Tag: Business

  • The Letter

    The Letter

    The following is an actual letter that was sent to a bank by a 96-year-old woman. The bank manager thought it amusing enough to have it published in the New York Times.

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    To whom it may concern,

    I am writing to thank you for bouncing my check with which I endeavored to pay my plumber last month. By my calculations, three nanoseconds must have elapsed between his depositing the check and the arrival in my account of the funds needed to honor it. I refer, of course, to the automatic monthly transfer of funds from my modest savings account, an arrangement which, I admit, has been in place for only thirty-one years.

    You are to be commended for seizing that brief window of opportunity, and also for debiting my account $30 by way of penalty for the inconvenience caused to your bank.

    My thankfulness springs from the manner in which this incident has caused me to rethink my errant financial ways. I noticed that whereas I personally attend to your telephone calls and letters, when I try to contact you, I am confronted by the impersonal, overcharging, pre-recorded, faceless entity which your bank has recently become.

    From now on, I, like you, choose only to deal with a flesh-and-blood person.

    My mortgage and loan repayments will therefore and hereafter no longer be automatic, but will arrive at your bank, by check, addressed personally and confidentially to an employee at your bank whom you must nominate.

    Be aware that it is an offense under the Postal Act for any other person to open such an envelope.

    Please find attached an Application Contact Status form which I require your chosen employee to complete.

    I am sorry it runs to eight pages, but in order that I know as much about him or her as your bank knows about me, there is no alternative.

    Please note that all copies of his or her medical history must be countersigned by a Notary Public, and the mandatory details of his/her financial situation (income, debts, assets and liabilities) must be accompanied by documented proof. In due course,

    I will issue your employee with a PIN number which he/she must quote in dealings with me. I regret that it cannot be shorter than 28 digits but, again, I have modeled it on the number of button presses required of me to access my account balance on your phone bank service. As they say, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

    Please allow me to level the playing field even further. When you call me, you will now have a menu of options on my new voice mail system to choose from.

    Please press the buttons as follows:

    Press 1: To make an appointment to see me.

    Press 2: To query a missing payment.

    Press 3: To transfer the call to my living room in case I am there.

    Press 4: To transfer the call to my bedroom in case I am sleeping.

    Press 5: To transfer the call to my toilet in case I am attending to nature.

    Press 6: To transfer the call to my mobile phone if I am not at home.

    Press 7: To leave a message on my computer, a password to access my computer is required. Password will be communicated to you at a later date to the Authorized Contact.

    Press 8: To return to the main menu and to listen to options 1 through 7.

    To make a general complaint or inquiry. The contact will then be put on hold, pending the attention of my automated answering service. While this may, on occasion, involve a lengthy wait, uplifting music will play for the duration of the call.

    Regrettably, but again following your example, I must also levy an establishment fee of $50 to cover the setting up of this new arrangement. Please credit my account after each occasion.

    Your Humble Client…

    (Remember: This was written by a 96-year-old woman!)

  • Shut up and take my money: Americans fed up with businesses taking political stands

    Shut up and take my money: Americans fed up with businesses taking political stands

    (AP Photo/Eric Risberg, File)

    Cam Edwards | Bearing Arms

    Whether it’s banks cutting off financial services to members of disfavored industries like the firearms sector or companies like Levi’s banning guns from stores and donating millions to anti-gun efforts, the gun control lobby has made great strides in convincing the corporate sector to adopt and advocate for their policies and practices over the past decade or so. I’d go so far as to say the biggest victories for the anti-gunners haven’t taken place in courtrooms, statehouses, or even the halls of Congress, but can be found instead in the culture at large.

    According to a new Gallup survey, however, Americans are getting sick and tired of being lectured by corporations like these… though it probably won’t come as a surprise that a majority of Democrats are still in support, given that the vast majority of companies who take public sides on issues like gun control embrace the Left’s ideology.

    Less than half of U.S. adults (41%) believe businesses should take a public stance on current events, down from 48% in 2022.

    The latest findings from the Bentley-Gallup Business in Society Report are based on a web survey with 5,458 U.S. adults conducted May 8-15, 2023, using the probability-based Gallup Panel.

    Political party identification has the strongest influence on whether Americans believe corporations should take a public stance. Most Democrats (62%) believe businesses should take a public stance on current events, compared with just 17% of Republicans and 36% of independents. While still high, the percentage of Democrats who believe businesses should take a stance has declined from 75% in 2022. The percentage of independents reporting companies should take a stance has declined slightly, by four percentage points, while Republicans’ views on this issue have remained essentially unchanged.

    The 13-point drop in support among Democrats is actually the largest decline of any of the three political ideologies surveyed, so even though roughly two-thirds of the Democrats who were surveyed are still supportive of corporate lectures on social responsibility, even on the Left there’s clearly a growing weariness over being told what to think, do, or say from big corporations.

    Interestingly, Gallup found that support or opposition to companies taking public stands on issues depends on what issues we’re talking about. 55% of those surveyed believe it’s appropriate for companies to talk about “climate change”, for instance. Corporate speech about gun control, on the other hand, is far less popular.

    Younger Americans are the most supportive of the actions of companies like Levi’s, but even there less than half of 18-to-29-year-olds who were surveyed say they’re in favor of corporate support for gun control. I’m happy to report that my own age demographic is the least supportive of these efforts to sway public opinion, with just one-third of 45-to-59-year-olds in favor.

    Of course, some companies have already learned the hard way that their customer base wants their products, not their opinions. As Newsweek reported just a few days ago, Anheuser-Busch is still struggling to recover from its Dylan Mulvaney debacle months after sales of Bud Light started tanking.

    The most-recent data from Bernstein in the week ending September 9 saw Bud Light with an 8.9 percent share of the U.S. beer market. This was down from 12 percent immediately before the boycott began.

    In the four weeks to September 9, Bud Light sales declined by around 30 percent in both volume and dollar value, compared to the same period a year ago. The statistics were compiled by Bump Williams Consulting.

    Speaking to Fox News Digital, Harry Schuhmacher, the Beer Business Daily publisher, said that the latest figures show that the decline in Bud Light sales has become “quasi permanent.”

    Schuhmacher added: “You see Bud Light still just stubbornly down around 30 percent in volume compared to last year, which is where it’s been since May or June.

    “That tells me that this is quasi-permanent, meaning those consumers are just lost forever,” he said.

    Makes sense to me. I haven’t bought a pair of Levi’s in years, though it was once the only brand of jeans I wore. When they decided to start funding gun control efforts I decided they could do so without using any of my money, and I’ve never looked back.

    Americans are sending a message that they’re fed up and sick of the haranguing and finger-wagging from the corporate sector, and while this survey alone may not change any attitudes in boardrooms, the recent experiences of companies like Anheuser-Busch and Target are a glaring warning sign to those CEOs who want to enlist their company in the Left’s culture wars; shut up and take our money, or keep talking and watch us walk away.

    Original Here