Sorry, Hon. Bill Morneau, You Have Been Conned....

I love being a swing voter.  It means I can find honorable people in all parties.  One of the people that I find honorable is our Federal Finance Minister Bill Morneau.  I believe he sincerely and earnestly is trying to do put Canada in a positive financial position.  It is impossible.  We are already in a recession and he will have to raise taxes next budget.  It will make him unpopular but he will have no choice.  It will less money in our pockets, but, it is good thing that there are a lot of things that money can't buy.  Those things are more important than money. 

However, back to him being honorable.  Shortly after the pandemic started closing our country, Minister Morneau spent a great deal of time negotiating on behalf on Canadians for banks to drop interest rates on consumer debt.  First of all, what a crock.  Banks just couldn't do the right thing, they had to have an intervention by the Federal Finance Minister.  Unbelievable.  But, regardless, banks finally agreed to do something that should have been natural.  Then, the Bank of Canada basically put the prime rate to zero.  So, banks are paying .25% for money and then loaning it to consumers for 19%.  (I have been told that it the average credit card rate.)  Loan sharks would salivate at that rate of return. 

Rather than just give all consumers a rate reduction, you had to apply for this from your bank.  I am in a parntership where we have two banks because we haven't amalgamated our banking.  So, I knew phone lines would make it impossible to get through, so I emailed both banks.  Two credit cards and one line of credit.  I followed the instructions on their web sites and waited.  The first bank responded 10 business days later to the inquiry about the credit card.  The email said that if our email was not answered by the FAQ, please send another email and this would be prioritized and answered in three days.  I sent a follow up email.  Two days later, I heard from the bank that they were temporarily for the next three months cutting the interest rate in half.  I was grateful, but, again, thought it should have been automatic.  A few days later, the email about the LOC was answered.  A reduction in interest rate was a non-starter and don't bother asking again because it was never going to happen. 

The email  for the second credit card was responded 15 business days later.  Again, I was required to send another email to prove that I was serious and it would be responded within 3 business days.  I sent the follow-up email and received a reply the same day.  They would be happy to cut my interest rate in half for four months on the condition that I would not make any payments for four months.  If I made a payment in the next four months, I will be forfeiting my reduced rate.  So, essentially, I will come out worse off. 

Of course, I have to see it from the bank's perspective.  Instead of making billions and billions this quarter, they will only be earning billions. 

So, despite the sappy commercials, it does not appear that banks really are doing all they can to help individuals Canadians.  Sorry, Mr. Morneau, your efforts have been wasted.