Dear Editor,
SN’s editorial on the ‘Banking Bureaucracy’ (November 23, 2018), could not have been more timely. Among others, it points to the almost robotic nature of some banking transactions (and those of other agencies), if at all the process gets that far. From some who are innocent beneficiaries of transactions, whether foreign or even local, the introductory conversation can range from neuter to intimidating, even to the more accustomed, partly because the server is not allowed any interpretive discretion.
Too often can be experienced this discouraging assumption that every different transaction requires the same customer to prove his/her identity once again, with a repetitious range of documentation. It is indeed a painful experience for those generations old enough to recall how ‘honour’, even of the ‘small man’, used to be a valued attribute (now debased by the eruption of the ‘big one’); and how productive it was to be taken at ‘one’s word’; at the same time being sensitive enough to appreciate that the apparent lack of empathy now is really no fault of the immediate service. It is but in fact behaviour resulting from a policy that takes minimal account of the age differentiation and its implications, for conducting productive human relationships in a more remote technological world. The situation could be further compounded by the not unusual limitations of education of the enquiring customer.
Not irrelevant is perhaps the example of the virtual disconnection of workers severed from the sugar industry, and who would have lost their corporate identity. The NIS could also be a formidable service with whom to interact. Not to mention the vast majority of pensioners who are bereft of the alacrity to deal with the technological requirements in their late days. There appears to be an indifference to their respective plights – to provide such implements as driver’s licence, TIN, utility bill and even proof of residence, where they may be dependents, and not tenants.
From our standpoint we live in an age in which the variety of ‘service providers’ do not necessarily regard senior citizens as a target group deserving of priority attention.
Hopefully the ‘providers’ will themselves retire with a clear conscience.
Yours faithfully,
(Name and address provided)
