HSBC - the Bank that likes to say No

Today I went to HSBC with the intention of paying £100 in cash in.  Loadsamoney!  Outside the remaining Croydon branch there is an intimidating security guard and inside there are three women one of whom has a laptop perched at bar hight tables with no uniform just casual clothing and an HSBC lanyard.  

There are four paying in machines.  I put my card in one.  Only a button for depositing cheques appeared on the screen.  I tried another and another and another with the same disappointing results.  

So I asked one of the three ladies which machines that said they took cash actually could take cash.  She said the first two and then looking at my card said "They won't take a first direct card though - it's to do with the switch from Visa to Mastercard [or was it the other way round?]."  I suppose that reveals something of what an empty shell this institution is, that it simply bows to the whims and caprices of the card providers...

In the absence of an automatic teller being able to count my money for me I asked if there was anyone at the manual teller desk all three of whose windows were closed.  "No," came the reply. 

Thinking that it was a bit farcical having a bank branch staffed by three ladies who were not allowed to take deposits... "Oh well," I said, "it's nice that you have the paying in counter there for ornamental effect."

The lady said they only had the staff to count money on weekdays.  So what do you do sitting at those tables on a Saturday Morning?  No one was buying any services off you so I presume it is a gossiping hub.  She proceeded to advise me that I could pay money in at the Post Office.  You know the place where the Horizon computer system didn't work, hundreds of thousands of pounds disappeared and the greatest miscarriage of justice in British legal history took place?  Yeah like I proper trust them with my wad.

You know how the Government could service the debt that it constantly says is crippling it?  Stop providing multi-million pound public subsidies to Post Office Limited to ensure it maintains a nationwide network of at least 11,500 branches within 3 miles of the population and get these lazy ladies and their parsimonious employer to put someone behind the paying in window on a Saturday Morning.  There's three of them - one for each paying in window?  

I mean what's the point of having a branch if it's like this?  What service are they offering?  Terminal smugness?  Nail filing?  Gossiping?  I'd compare them to Carol Beer but at least she looked at her computer before saying it said no.  These ladies are more like the old Churchill Insurance dog.  "Oh no no no no no no no..."