«-- Letter Re: The US Tax Giveaway Economic Stimulus Charade | Main | Letter Re: Help With a Non-Preparedness Minded Spouse --»
Letter Re: The Five Minute Bank Run
Dear Mr. Rawles:
I wanted to tell you a personal experience I just had at the bank that scares
me to death. If you think a bank can last a few days during a bank run, then
you will be very surprised by my story.
I wanted to withdraw $10,000 from a JP Morgan Chase Bank branch in a local
Houston [, Texas] suburb. Chase is the second largest bank in the US and Houston
is the fourth largest city in the US. I went in and said: “Can I please
have my money?” The teller disappeared for 10 minutes and then came back,
and told me to my surprise that “We don’t carry that much cash
on hand”. I was shocked. I said: “Are you kidding me?” She
went on to explain that, even though this was a payday weekend at the end of
the month (which means they have more cash on hand than usual), if I took that
amount from them, they would be completely out of cash in a few hours. They
suggested that I travel seven miles to a larger local Chase branch and ask
them.
So, I drove over to the larger Chase branch. When I got there, they had only
one teller working (now think about the implications of one teller
working during a bank run with hundreds of people in line). After waiting in
line for
10 minutes,
I walked up to the teller and asked her for the amount. She then told me that
she would have to go into the vault to see if they had enough money there!
Now this is getting scary because I was starting to think that I might not
get my cash – and this isn’t even a bank run! She came back with
the cash and gave it to me, but then told me that I need to call ahead next
time
for that amount. Hmmm… $10,000 just isn’t that great an amount
and now I need to call ahead?
I wanted to tell you this story because the implications are very scary: the
second largest bank in the USA in the fourth largest metropolitan area only
has enough cash on hand to allow one depositor to empty his/her
account. A bank run
in the
USA would only last five minutes because only a handful of people will be able
to get their money out [in cash].
Needless to say, I am getting all my money out, ASAP. - W.D.in Texas
