ABA Banking Journal - November 2007 - (Page 42A)

REPORTER’S NOTES DIY , U.K. style The personal odyssey of a confirmed do-it-yourselfer on “holiday” in England. Wherein is explored some of that nation’s self-service and payments technology We were in the prime of checkout time and Ellen didn’t return with a fresh card for ten minutes. Back online we went. The rate I was hoping to book, using a special promotional code, was very good. Too good, in fact. We’d booked the car and then discovered, just as the terminal began blocking the screen with warning messages again, that I’d used the wrong starting date. Back to the queue? Ellen looked at the agency’s address. “Isn’t that only three or four blocks away? Why don’t we just walk there and stop playing with this silly thing?” Words to live by. But even do-it-yourself offline wasn’t simple. Turns out the area included a Bryanston Mews, Bryanston Square, and Bryanston Street, none of them actually connected with each other, and only one the right location. With some help from a Royal Mail delivery man, however, we did find the place and booked a car without having to buy any more internet cards. I It was almost like leaving behind an arm or a leg. But I’d done it. I had left my laptop back in America, because I was going to really be completely on vacation. But one little detail I hadn’t had time to take care of while home was finalizing the rental car arrangements. And, after two days in London, as we would be leaving the city for other parts of England in eight hours, it now seemed like a priority. How I wished I’d brought my laptop! I’m a do-it-yourself type, whether it’s ordering online or checking in the day before for boarding passes. But I’d counted on the ubiquity of internet cafes, or, failing that, the hotel’s business center. So, after checking out and storing our bags at the Marriott Marble Arch, we hit the hotel’s lobby internet terminal to nail down the prices I’d scouted on the web a week earlier. Problem was, unlike Marriotts in much of the U.S., these terminals, provided by iBAHN Europe, weren’t free. Nor did they operate with credit cards. You had to buy time on little cards from the front desk, where, of course, there was a line. My wife, Ellen, hit the “queue,” as they call it here, while I looked over the printouts I had brought along to see which rental company offered the best deal. A short while later Ellen arrived with a 15-minute card. How long could it take for a techsavvy New Yorker to book a car online? I logged on. Thirteen minutes, and a few surprises later, I was being warned with large, screen-obscuring messages that I was about to run out of time. Ellen dashed back to the front desk to buy more time. In the meantime, the terminal ended the connection, and, because it was designed to maximize security in a public venue, it dumped everything I’d spent £2 of connection time entering. By Steve Cocheo, executive editor Paying about London We’d left for England with the advice of friends not to worry much about cash, as using ATMs overseas has become quite reliable. And this was so. We never had any trouble taking cash out, though we did have a terminological barrier to overcome. Nearly every ATM we used or saw bragged that their ATMs were “fee free.” In the U.S. that means one thing—free. In the U.K. it means, “We won’t charge you on top of what your bank and the network will charge you.” And it didn’t stop our own bank’s network from charging a fee. Still, being able to draw cash wherever ATMs were found—and they seemed as ubiquitous as in the U.S.—sure beat using bulky money-belts or having to buy travelers checks. The British pound coin, by the way, really looks and feels like money, not like our recent succession of wimpy dollar coins. It has heft, and a pocketful of them makes you feel kind of www.ababj.com/subscribe.html ABA BANKING JOURNAL/NOVEMBER 2007 42a http://www.ababj.com/subscribe.html

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of ABA Banking Journal - November 2007

ABA Banking Journal - November 2007 Contents Editor’s Column Briefing: Good News for Mortgages Sleight of Mind N.Y. Hiring Bonanza May Be Bane Snapshot: A Look at Held-For-Investment Loan Growth ABA Resources ABA Chairman’s Position “The Moose Bank” Thrives on Manufactured Housing Loans Finding the Middle Way for Your Bank’s Retirement Program Pass the Aspirin Cover Story: Self-Service Steps Up DIY U.K. Style Marketing to Millennials Getting Real With “Gen Wired” Ethnic Marketing: Disinterested Banking Getting Good at Global Sourcing Case in Point Turn Compliance on It's Head Banker’s Mart To Advertise/Index of Advertisers The Economy

ABA Banking Journal - November 2007

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