Yeah, I can see you !

Time for some nonsense, people !

I know that no one really wants to hear about work, but I  have a kind of unique job that provides some moments of, well,  absurdity that should be documented.

I am a personal teller, kind of an odd name for someone who is nowhere near the person she is waiting on. Not to worry, it will all become clear...

I  work at a local credit union, the only one in the country to offer a 24/7 personal teller system.  Yes, I said 24/7.  Yes, you can come to our credit union at 3 am and you can talk to a live person and cash your paycheck.  You can even come in on Sunday and we will be there.  We are staffed continuously except for Christmas Day and Thanksgiving Day.  Not so fun for us, but pretty convenient for our members.

 I am part of  a pool of people who wait on members remotely, through a personal teller machine that is capable of two-way audio and visual communication.  This machine looks a lot like an ATM, but if you press the "start" button you quickly will  see that this is no ATM...

In fact, some unsuspecting people get so flustered that they just back up and run away, because when they hit that button one of us appears on the screen and tries to talk to them !  This happened much more when we first started the operation, but it is still pretty funny to see grown people back away and pretend that they never touched this machine.  Some are  just speechless and stare at you, not sure what to make of this craziness.

So I sit in my cubicle and talk to random people all day, from 6 different branches, helping them with their banking needs.  I get to wear a rather annoyingly heavy headset  that is not cordless, so I am tethered to my station for most of the day.  Don't even ask what this does to my hair.  I have gotten pretty good at seeing how far my leash will let me roam, but that is basically only to the neighboring cubicles. I am still getting used to looking at the webcam when speaking to the member, rather than looking at their image on my screen.  We are on camera nearly all day, but there are no makeup people in sight...

We are unique as tellers in that we wait on people in different towns and even counties, so you get to see a lot of regional differences.  The members from the wealthier communities do more deposits, deal less with cash and more with checks.  Occasionally have a bit of a condescending attitude, too.  They get annoyed when they have to show their ID,  shouldn't everyone already KNOW who they are ?
The people from the less wealthy communities deal mostly with cash and spend more of their time paying loans and withdrawing money, if at all possible...  They like to send other people to pay their loans,  kind of interesting.

So what kind of questions do I get asked?  Am I an avatar ?  Seriously, why would anyone create an avatar of a 50 year old woman wearing glasses?  I  mean really, people.  The  other popular question is "Can you see me too ?"   Well, I  just asked you to place your photo ID on our scanner so I  can verify who you are, so yeah, I  can see you.  I can even see your boyfriend lurking on the side, or your wife standing behind you telling you what to do !  And no, I  am not inside the machine, does that really make any sense ?

Communicating with people about their money can be amusing in itself.  Many people come to us and declare that they are cashing their check, but what they really mean is that they are depositing it and getting some money back.  Some are depositing to their "checkings," not really sure how this became plural...   One enterprising young man  comes in to "direct deposit his check."  Who needs electronic banking when you can do it yourself ?

Also, the phrase "a lot of money" means very different things to different people.  Usually when people say this, they mean maybe a few hundred, nothing really astonishing.  The people that are dealing with thousands have no need for "a lot of money."  I especially like the people who need the balance on their account, in the multiple  thousands, only to take out $40.  Like that $40 bucks is really going to break  them...

Then there are the jokes.
"Can I help you with anything else ?" say I.
"Well, if you have the winning lotto numbers that would be great !"
If I had the winning lotto numbers, why would I  be sitting here ?

or
"Wow, if this thing is 24/7, you must drink a lot of coffee !"
Sigh.

or
"If you have any extra hundreds, that would be okay !"
No, that would not be okay,  I  would rather keep my job.

Such is the life of the "personal teller."