This very long press release, announced a year ago, was the beginning of the new hit reality series - The Barons of Ain't: They ain't done nothin' wrong!

This entire season reminds me of a funny conversation I had with them toward the end of my time as a customer:

Me: "Hi, is this Bank of America credit card services?"

Them: "Yes it is, how can I help you?"

Me: "Hello, I'd like to pay off my credit balance?"

Them: "Ok, I can help you with that. How would you like to transfer the payment?"

Me: "I have a debit card from my bank account, can I use that?"

Them: "Sure, go ahead."

Me: "XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX"

Them: "Great, that's XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX?"

Me: "Yep!"

Them: "And we are paying the full balance of $XXXX.XX?"

Me: "Yep!"

Them: "Ok, running the card... and payment has been accepted!"

Me: "Great! Can I make absolutely certain that the balance is Zero?"

Them: "Yes! You are completely clear. The balance is at Zero."

Me: "Great, thank you!"

Them: "You're welcome, thanks for calling B of A."

Fast forward 6 months.

Them: "Hello, is this Mr. Newton?"

Me: "Yes it is."

Them: "Hello, you have a past due payment on your Bank of America credit card to the amount of $115 dollars?"

Me: "(WTF?!?!?!)Uhhh... No I don't. You guys told me that my account didn't have anything on it."

Them: "Sorry sir, you do have a balance that is outstanding beyond 90 days."

Me: "Uhhh... What was the balance six months ago?"

Them: "16 cents."

Me: "How in the ... did 16 cents become $115?"

Them: "You have incurred late charges."
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It went on from there to me learning the tough lesson that the interest turnover from month to month had already processed when I made the initial call, causing there to be a small balance left on my card, contrary to what the helpful phone person assured me.

Another friend of mine had to call B of A several times and visit his local branch at least a dozen times over the course of six months to get them to completely, 100%, no exception CLOSE his checking account. For some reason, they didn't seem to understand that he really did want it closed.

There are other examples of interesting encounters with Bank of America that I have in my friends circle.

This lady has her own bone to pick:


There's the judge who just nailed them for billions in bonuses, and something about Andrew Cuomo, Attorney General of New York State suing them for similar reasons. And remember, this all started with BofA CEO Ken Lewis getting fired.

The reality of this is clear, and I don't think Bank of America is the only one: they operate with a 'guilty until proven innocent' business philosophy. In other words, it is better for them to try and charge us unreasonable amounts of money and defend against the few who fight back, then it is for them to afford the benefit of the doubt or allow more leniency.

Seriously, just do a google search of 'credit card lawsuits.'

It's a house of cards waiting to fall again, especially with the rumblings of financial machinery clicking back into a pre-meltdown state.

It didn't really occur to me until just now, but there are some very interesting things on the interwebs regarding Corporate Personhood. Corporations have been given the rights of people for over a century now, but lets ask this, Is there such thing as a wise corporation?. Bank of America doesn't appear to be wise, because it is cannabalizing the consumers who support it. Many corporations don't appear to be wise, but then why would we apply such adjectives to something that only exists on paper? The 2003 documentary, The Corporation has a line in there that says, "If a corporation were a real person, it would be considered a psychopath." What would a wise corporation look like?

All these thoughts on wisdom bring me to a really cool TED talk I know of (yes, I love TED!). This doesn't have much to do with corporate behavior, but I find it interesting to apply corporation 'personhood' to this line of thinking: