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Simple ATM cards being declined

status.simple.com

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Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#51

Post by lsc »

jacquesm wrote: post #37
gojomo wrote: post #33

Sibling threads touting banks as paragons of reliability, with any momentary loss-of-access-to-funds as unforgivable, must have been dealing with a different banking system than me. With major banks like BofA, Citibank, and others, I've had… • credit cards often disabled for fraud-alert false alarms • check deposits sometimes subject to mysterious fund-availability delays • individual ATM clusters or whole ATM networ…

Errors on individual transactions and reporting being unavailable is not the same as transactions simply not happening at all. Stuff happens to banks and then people switch to other banks, especially when you're a new player. If my bank did this to me I'd be gone instantly, I almost did just over their inability to keep telebanking working through a denial of service attack, and then blaming it on the hackers. All my…

>If that bank does not do its job I can't do mine.

If banking is that important to you, then perhaps you ought to consider redundant providers? I mean, that's what you do with connectivity. you don't rely on one provider with a good sla; no, you get two providers.

Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#52

Post by gojomo »

jacquesm wrote: post #42
gojomo wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I highly doubt Simple's invite-only early-adopters are dependent on their Simple card as their only way to buy beer and/or (your downthread example) gas for the drive home. (And I hope they're not using their card for both on the same night.) #firstWorldProblems

You really should have a look at how Simple bills itself. They bill themselves expressly as a replacement for your bank. The whole idea is that you absolutely rely on simple to do their thing or you might as well not use them. http://simple.com/ If Simple is used the way they intend you to use them those scenarios are playing out right now. You really can't shift the blame for that onto those that believed the Simple…

And as noted in my other comment, my giant banks have failed in similar ways, leaving my to my own other options or simply shit-outta-luck for a few hours. You seem to have a similar complaint above about 'Rabobank'.

I don't see any marketing claim on the Simple site that they'll have fewer outages than the Rabobanks/BofAs of the world. (Where do you see that claim, or actual delivered level of service, from any actual existing bank?)

Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#54

Post by jacquesm »

lsc wrote: post #51
jacquesm wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Errors on individual transactions and reporting being unavailable is not the same as transactions simply not happening at all. Stuff happens to banks and then people switch to other banks, especially when you're a new player. If my bank did this to me I'd be gone instantly, I almost did just over their inability to keep telebanking working through a denial of service attack, and then blaming it on the hackers. All my…

>If that bank does not do its job I can't do mine. If banking is that important to you, then perhaps you ought to consider redundant providers? I mean, that's what you do with connectivity. you don't rely on one provider with a good sla; no, you get two providers.

There are quite a few problems that come with setting up double accounts for every company that I'm involved with. You'd have to spread the funds around in such a way that you could cover any contingency from any account, which in effect would mean that you's need twice the money. It also means a lot more work for the bookkeeper, two two factor auth tokens to keep on me, two account managers to manage, double the contracts and so on.

They deal I have with my bank is simple: they do their work, they get to keep transaction fees, screw me on the interbank interest rates and delay foreign transactions just long enough that they can go play with my cash. In return I expect them to deliver one thing: utter reliability.

If it gets to the point that there is no single bank that gives me the feeling that they can do just that I will indeed have to split assets across several banks. (there are other good reasons to do that, such as the maximum insured balance per account holder).

But the costs of doing so are what is holding me from that.

Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#55

Post by wmf »

suresk wrote: post #50
wmf wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC the original innovations of Simple were (1) usable UI (including mobile) and (2) a single account that's debit and credit. #1 has been mostly caught up by traditional banks and #2 mostly benefits financially irresponsible people (of which there are many, but perhaps not many around here).

I may be misunderstanding you re: #2, but it their Simple card appears to just be a debit card with no overdraft protection.

Their original claim from 2010 was "We will launch later this year with a simple card with in built checking, savings, rewards and a line of credit." Since they're still in invite-only beta, maybe not all of the features have been implemented yet.

Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#56

Post by jacquesm »

gojomo wrote: post #52
jacquesm wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You really should have a look at how Simple bills itself. They bill themselves expressly as a replacement for your bank. The whole idea is that you absolutely rely on simple to do their thing or you might as well not use them. http://simple.com/ If Simple is used the way they intend you to use them those scenarios are playing out right now. You really can't shift the blame for that onto those that believed the Simple…

And as noted in my other comment, my giant banks have failed in similar ways, leaving my to my own other options or simply shit-outta-luck for a few hours. You seem to have a similar complaint above about 'Rabobank'. I don't see any marketing claim on the Simple site that they'll have fewer outages than the Rabobanks/BofAs of the world. (Where do you see that claim, or actual delivered level of service, from any actu…

For me their homepage has text on it like this:

'get ready to leave your bank'

'unmatched security and support'

'replace your bank'

'use the simple card for all your purchases'

Those set the stage for some pretty high expectations, they make it plain simple expects to be your sole provider.

Rabobank fucked up once in 20 years, and then only on a peripheral part of their service (ATM and point-of-sale still worked). If they had dropped the ball on either I'd be out of there for sure.

Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#57

Post by gojomo »

jacquesm wrote: post #56
gojomo wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And as noted in my other comment, my giant banks have failed in similar ways, leaving my to my own other options or simply shit-outta-luck for a few hours. You seem to have a similar complaint above about 'Rabobank'. I don't see any marketing claim on the Simple site that they'll have fewer outages than the Rabobanks/BofAs of the world. (Where do you see that claim, or actual delivered level of service, from any actu…

For me their homepage has text on it like this: 'get ready to leave your bank' 'unmatched security and support' 'replace your bank' 'use the simple card for all your purchases' Those set the stage for some pretty high expectations, they make it plain simple expects to be your sole provider. Rabobank fucked up once in 20 years, and then only on a peripheral part of their service (ATM and point-of-sale still worked). I…

Not one of those implies "fewer brief outages" than traditional banks.

Re: Simple ATM cards being declined

#59

Post by jacquesm »

gojomo wrote: post #57
jacquesm wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me their homepage has text on it like this: 'get ready to leave your bank' 'unmatched security and support' 'replace your bank' 'use the simple card for all your purchases' Those set the stage for some pretty high expectations, they make it plain simple expects to be your sole provider. Rabobank fucked up once in 20 years, and then only on a peripheral part of their service (ATM and point-of-sale still worked). I…

Not one of those implies "fewer brief outages" than traditional banks.

It's resolved now.

Almost four hours isn't brief. And I've never had a point-of-sale or ATM outage like that, ever. (other than the power blackout a few years back in the North-East, but not being able to pay for stuff was the least of your problems back then. By the way, our gas station was the only one running for 75 miles around because I had actually thought through how we'd operate in a situation like that).

It looks as if we hold our payment service providers to different standards. I expect mine to be there when I need them, you're ok with whatever your definition of 'brief outages' is.

It makes me wonder what it would take for you to start wondering if you've got your money parked with the right institution.

For me not being able to get at it when I need it is the one thing that would do it.

Anyway, great for 'simple' that they have it resolved, this will likely slow their adoption for a bit (though sync is on the ball in this thread and turning lemons into lemonade) and it will hopefully cause some serious introspection inside simple to make sure stuff like this will never happen again.

And maybe I'm wrong and old fashioned in my attitude towards payment services and we should just cut all those banks some slack and accept periodic outages. But my mid 80's bosses would fire my ass very quickly if I displayed that attitude on the job and I think it is too far ingrained in me to let go of.

Doesn't worry me in the least.

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