Nothing overly complex, but a high school graduate should be able to balance a checkbook and fill out a 1040EZ when they graduate. Surely balancing a checkbook is as important as trigonometry …

As far as removing the file, while it’s true it can be done, it isn’t done often at all. Most banks want to keep you on that list to let other banks know you have a history of account abuse. I always advise people to double-check if they were told it was done. That may not have actually been the case. But, it can be done, as you said, with the specific verbiage from the bank.

@ FB – Unfortunately, there’s a lot we take for granted in finance and I often find myself wondering why people don’t know things. When I’m dealing with someone asking my what I deem as pretty obvious questions, I step back and remember this story. I bet the personal banker helping me thought it was pretty obvious what was going on, but they never actually explained it to me. I didn’t know until I was told.

@ Slackerjo – I hate checks, too! I very rarely write them these days.

@ 444 – They can really sucker punch college kids sometimes. Although, USAA is a great company and if I could do business with them, I totally would.

@ Steven – Exactly! That’s a great parallel!

@ Jace – Yes and no. In my case, I hadn’t been reported yet. It takes a little bit of time before they report you to either Chexsystems or Telecheck. I’ll probably be covering this in detail in an upcoming post, so I won’t go into it here, but the banks do not remove you from Chexsystems once an item is paid. They will update the records to reflect the balance has been paid, but you still show up for five years – at which point you fall off their records. And some banks may not close out your accounts if you pop up on the list after the fact, but will monitor you. Other banks may offer the second-chance checking which allows you to open an account despite being on Chexsystems.

@ Debtfree2009 – That’s great! There are some of us out there in the land of banking that actually have our customer’s best interests at heart. We genuinely want to do what’s right for the customer and not what’s an easy sale for us. I’m glad to read that the banker took her time to explain things to your son. I’m also willing to bet, though that you’ve passed on some financial lessons over the years, so you probably made her job a little easier.

Lessons learned the hard way for most of us. Hopefully financial education in the future will prepare kids properly.

He asked her, “Maam – didn’t you ever put air in these ties?”

She said, “What do you mean? Didn’t they come with air in them when I bought them?!?!”

You can’t presume everyone has the same understanding of reality!

I understood bank accounts pretty well because I only had savings accounts and they’re hard to misunderstand, but I was given a $2,500 USAA credit card upon graduating college (USAA just offered it to me) and believe it or not, as an intelligent 22-year-old person, I had no real understanding of what a credit card even was. At first I didn’t even use it, I was so confused by it. I didn’t know there was such thing as borrowing money, I think. I also thought that there was no such thing as not paying something when it was due – I must have believed people went to prison immediately or something like that if they missed any payment. Later I understood how credit cards worked just enough to royally screw up that card, and another they graciously gave me after that, and only years later did they take a chance on me again. This time I understand it all to well and they will not be sorry they gave me a third chance. Building up good credit now that I understand it on an expert level is one of my major goals. Sometimes years are needed to truly “get” finances, even when we’re intelligent and otherwise capable adults.

Online banking and auto pay are the way to go. Even when I made $22K a year, I could still do auto pay.