Bank-Induced Paranoia

A week and a half ago I filled out the forms to open my RBS savings and checking accounts. The nice woman said I would receive my cards by mail in four to five business days. The following Tuesday, cardless, I go back into RBS to ask what the hold up was. The guy behind the plexie-glass tells me that my cards have been canceled. At this news I was a little put off and asked him why, to which he explained that if you do not activate the cards in a certain amount of time, the bank cancels them for protective reasons. Well this is just annoying, because how could I activate them if I never got them?! He doesn't know how to answer this question. Instead, he offers to order me new cards. Yes please. Duh. OK, done. New cards ordered. I should receive them by mail in four to five business days... and we're right back where we started.

        
I checked my address three times to make sure they were sending them to the right place. Then I asked him to check to see if my accounts were open, because if they were open, then I could withdraw cash from them without cards while I waited for mine to arrive in the mail. Yes, they were both open. Great, can I have an account balance of them please? Sure, £0. For both?! For both. Please don't tell me you lost $5,000. (Now I know why he is behind a plexie-glass shield). So I "calmly" explain to him how I brought a check with me for $5,000 to deposit into my new RBS accounts, to do the exchange rate only once. He went into the back room and came out with both good and bad news. The good news was that the bank didn't lose my money. Sigh of relief. The bad news wss that it takes five to six weeks for a dollar check to clear. Excuse me?!? It's a cashier's check from a Citizens Bank (which is you guys, in case you've forgotten!) RBS = Citizens... same bloody thing! So to sum up, I handed you a cashier's check, that was essentially from you, and then instead of depositing it into my account, you put it in a folder to collect dust for six weeks while you make sure that you are in fact a reliable source according to you.

...Right then.

It wouldn't matter all that much if the Citizen's Bank people didn't put a hold on my US credit card. After about three purchases over here, my card started to get declined everywhere that I tried to use it. I didn't tell them ahead of time that I was going overseas because I thought I would have an RBS card by this point. Citizen's suspected a stolen credit card, so to protect me they stopped allowing me to use it. If banks would only stop trying to protect me, then maybe I'd be able to actually spend some money, and eat and buy other essential things for survival...

The only conclusion that I can possibly draw from all of this is that Citizen's/RBS is out to get me.