This is a story from my dad.
During a recession he applied for a small personal loan for a few thousand dollars from his bank. He had excellent credit, was a homeowner, stable job, yadda yadda. His loan approval should’ve sailed through easily.
But because of the recession, the bank was trying to be extra careful about loaning out money. A loan officer called him to review his paperwork, and asked him what he was going to spend the loan on.
Dad was pissed. He said it’s a PERSONAL loan, and it’s none of their business what he’s going to do with it. It’s personal.
The bank dude was really nice, he explained the situation and said he’s just doing his job. He had to fill out paperwork, one of the spaces required that he writes what dad was going to do with the money.
Dad said, “Ok, when I get the money, I’m going to take it all out of the bank in cash, go home, open my window and throw it all outside.”
He found out a few days later he was approved for the loan.
I would have said I was going to dump it all on my bed then roll around with it while stark naked.
Uh… it’s ok sir, you can just keep the money.
Stonks.
I used to frequently transfer money between two countries, the process of which required talking to a human at the time. During one such conversation, the Customer Service Representative asked a new question: “What’s the purpose of the transfer?” This immediately took me aback, partly because I didn’t expect the question and partly because, much like your father, it’s none of their fucking business.
After stumbling a bit, I learned the magic phrase “personal use”. After that, every transfer I initiated was for “personal use” until such time as the bank automated the process and I no longer needed to speak to a human to transfer the money across an international border.
I have no earthly idea why “personal use” is acceptable, since it conveys no more useful information than writing nothing, but then it’s not my policy and I don’t care.
I hate that they have to ask that too, but my understanding is the legal reasoning is to try and weed out money launderers or some shit like that.
As an aside, let me just encourage everyone here to use credit unions. I needed a very small loan once, only $500, to send to a sibling in another state who had lost his job and just needed short-term help. They wouldn’t approve the $500, but I was told they would approve $4000, which infuriated me as it was clearly a predatory tactic.
So I switched to a CU. My CU even taught me how to avoid overdraft fees in case I ever make a mistake. (Keep a line of credit open, that way if I accidentally overdraft the money would come from that and no fees.) I love banking with them.
