Posted: Dec 10 06:56:38 1996

A Look Back and Peek Forward At Canadian Banks

 Take a trip with me down memory lane. Back to the days before 
 computers, video games and television: only 45 years ago. We'll have 
 a look, from a personal perspective, at a small town bank office of 
 the fifties, what it looks like in the nineties, and what may be in 
 store as we round the bend into the twenty-first century. 


 As a young lad of nineteen, fresh out of high school and no means of 
 moving on to university, I was fortunate to be hired by a local 
 bank. It was June 16, 1951 in a small Northern Ontario town. I 
 remember it as a wet, dreary morning. Yet, as I rang the buzzer to 
 be let in, I was oblivious to the torrent of water streaming down my 
 raincoat. I felt like a man on the verge of a discovery. Although I 
 had been in this bank a few times before, this was a new dimension 
 for me; now I was walking in as an employee; I was going to be 
 a wheeler and dealer in high finances - pretty high ideals for 
 someone who could barely fill in a deposit slip. 

 That building had been built around 1916 as a two storey 
 structure with male staff quarters upstairs. In those early 
 days, male bankers (there were not many female employees) did 
 not earn enough to support a family. Permission to marry had 
 to be obtained from the bank's Head Office. 

 Today's buildings, in small towns, may be two or three stories 
 high with office spaces on the upper floors and may be leased 
 from a private developer: leasing is often considered more 
 cost-efficient than tying up your assets in property. 

 The sweet aroma of fresh wax and the pungent odour of 
 furniture polish assailed my nostrils as I walked in that 
 morning. The long, wide room was dimly lit by large, round, 
 white globes hanging from the high ceiling. Along the side 
 wall in the customer area were two dark brown wooden benches 
 each with a polished brass spittoon on the floor (though never 
 used as such, they were remnants of an earlier gold-rush era). 
 There were two elbow-high, wooden customer desks, complete 
 with ink wells, a small stack of blotters, and two black, 
 wooden straight pens with nibs lying in a groove along the 
 top; a good supply of blank deposits, counter cheques, and 
 withdrawal slips sat in neat slots under the desk top; a 
 glossy perpetual calendar hung on the wall above it to remind 
 people what date it was. 

 A long, darkly stained counter divided the employees' area 
 from the customer area; one teller's station - the head teller 
 - was completely caged in dark brown heavy wire mesh with a 
 locked door, while the other teller stations sported a thin 
 glass window with a three inch gap at the bottom to allow 
 people to slip their transactions to the teller. 


 Gradually, over the past forty years, bank designs have 
 shifted. The old odours of wax and polish are gone, replaced 
 by the pleasant smell of synthetic carpeting and fresh plants. 
 The public (customer) areas are wider and roomier with lower 
 ceilings and recessed lighting providing optimum candle power. 
 Comfortable leather or fabric chairs adorn the area and modern 
 polished, white metal desks with ball point pens, chained or 
 wired, and a convenient calculator imbedded into the surface - 
 to prevent theft no doubt. No more ink wells, pen with nibs 
 and blotters. Cages for tellers are also a thing of the past. 
 Open teller stations and brighter colours prevail. 


 Back in the fifties, posting machines recorded all 
 transactions in individuals and business accounts. These were 
 noisy, clunky machines which relied on mechanical gears and 
 levers to function. Cards were slipped into a carriage, keys 
 were punched on the large front panel, motors whirred, gears 
 and levers clunked and clicked for a second or two, the 
 carriage slid to the left and back to the right to take 
 another card; a very time consuming task, depending on the 
 operator's experience and speed. 

 The hand-cranked adding machine was another mechanical 
 workhorse in the earlier offices. In the office I worked in, 
 we had two purely mechanical machines with a pull-down crank 
 on the side which gave your right arm (there were no left hand 
 cranks) a good work-out. We also had an adding machine using 
 an electrical motor to do the work of the crank. But both used 
 gears and levers to perform the adding function. They were 
 only used for long lists of figures or where a printed list 
 was needed for permanent records. If you only had a few 
 amounts to add up, you didn't even think of using the adding 
 machine. At the end of the day when everything had to be 
 totalled up and balanced, the adding machines were on a first 
 come, first served basis; the slower employee would simply 
 wait his or her turn or add the columns in their head (a good 
 knowledge of mathematics was a must in those days). Electrical 
 adding machines with some multiplication and dividing 
 functions came out in the late fifties and were considered a 
 great advancement. 

 Desktop electric calculators did not come into the picture 
 until the late sixties. Today, every desk has either an 
 updated desk calculator or pocket-size (for portability) or 
 both and the old clunkers are merely history. 


 Typewriters, manual and later, electrical, were still around 
 in those days but used mainly by the Manager's Secretary. 
 Today, almost every desk has a computer terminal and keyboard. 
 The Secretary's typewriter has been replaced by either a 
 computerized version or a standard computer keyboard and 
 monitor linked to a server loaded with modern word-processing 
 software, complete with spell-checker and a spreadsheet 
 program. 


 On-line banking gradually crept onto the scene during the 
 sixties as well; in the beginning, only the savings and 
 personal chequing accounts went on-line but, eventually, 
 current accounts (business accounts) were added. Branches are 
 connected by telephone lines to central computers. Those 
 clunky posting, adding machines and manual typewriters were 
 relegated to the junk piles or museums. No more would it be 
 necessary to wheel out those metal carts containing metal 
 trays of account cards to update and show the customers. 
 Today, the computer has taken over. Now the information shows 
 up on the teller's video screen at his or her side and 
 accounts are updated on the computer files, stored hundreds or 
 thousands of miles away. 

 The evolutionary changes made a dramatic improvement in the 
 sounds within the office as well. Before computerization, 
 mechanical machines such as the manual typewriter with its 
 ping at the end of the carriage slide, posting machines with 
 their clatter and clunking of gears and levers, the adding 
 machines loud bang each time the crank was pulled, and the 
 loud shrill of a ringing telephone filled the whole place with 
 a constant din. In today's banks, a quiet hush seems to 
 permeate the area broken only by the murmured chatter between 
 customer and staff and the soft ring of telephones. 

 Technological advances in furnishings are also quite evident 
 in the working areas with advances in plastics, synthetic 
 fibres and new processes in wood and fibre board. 

 In the fifties, only the Manager, Secretary and Senior 
 Officers had desks to sit and work at while the rest worked 
 from high, slopping desks with stools to rest their weary 
 feet: tellers were not allowed to sit on a stool at their 
 station; now they have comfortable swing-away seats and all 
 non-tellers have a modern, sit-down desk. Those sloping desks 
 are also gone to their just rewards, wherever that may be. 


 Until the advent of on-line banking, each branch maintained 
 its own accounting records. Other than customer account 
 transactions, every entry affecting the bank's assets or 
 liabilities was handwritten into bound books; general ledgers, 
 journals, cash books and other subsidiary ledgers. These were 
 permanent records and ballpoint pens, arriving on the scene in 
 the fifties, were not used since they were thought to fade 
 with time. Some of these books were big and heavy; that's why 
 it was generally the junior's (or the youngest male member of 
 the staff) responsibility to carry them out of the vault each 
 day, place them in their proper upright slot under the 
 counter, and carry them back into the vault at night. 

 It is very doubtful that any handwritten ledgers or journals 
 are to be found in today's banks - except maybe in downstairs 
 dusty storage vaults. These days, with central data banks, 
 summaries or details of a branch's operation are only a few 
 key strokes away. On arrival in the morning, a simple boot-up 
 of the computer and everything is at the employee's fingertip. 

 Dress codes is another area vastly improved over the past 
 forty-five years. In the fifties, white shirt (coloured shirts 
 came in later), tie and jacket had to be worn at all times 
 during business hours, no matter how hot and stifling the 
 heat: only after the doors were locked at three in the 
 afternoon were the men allowed to remove their jackets. 
 Relief from the mugginess was provided by big, floor-standing 
 electric fans until window air conditioning came into vogue. 

 For the women, dresses were the norm with some variations. 
 Some offices managed by puritan-type old men, even forbade 
 slacks. 

 The dress codes of today are much more relaxed. Neatness is 
 the main criteria. Some women prefer the comfort of trendy 
 jeans, sweaters, and blouses. Other women prefer stylish 
 dresses with form fitting jackets. Men, in general, are still 
 sticking to shirt, tie and jacket, but the jacket quite often 
 is on the back of their chairs, even during office hours. The 
 only discernible code seems to be - no obnoxious wear such as 
 rock-band t-shirts, hockey sweaters and the likes of those. 


 This sketch would be incomplete if I didn't touch on the 
 subject of communication, both within and without the office. 
 Within the office, staff meetings were the norm for imparting 
 information to the staff as a whole. Directions, policies, and 
 notices of staff changes, raises,and bonuses from the Head 
 Office were related by regular mail until banks started wide 
 use of courier services. Corresponding with customers was 
 always done in writing (on that clattering typewriter) and 
 sent by regular mail. Telephones in the fifties still used the 
 rotary dial until the sixties when they were replaced by the 
 push-button pad. Computers and miniaturization made sweeping 
 changes to all modes of communicating. Banks, being part of a 
 Wide Area Network (WAN) make wide use of email to communicate 
 among branches and fax machines for instant relay of documents 
 and messages to anyone having such a facility. Cellular phones 
 enable bank officials to keep in touch with their office or 
 conduct any business from wherever they may be, in or out of 
 the office. 

 As we round the bend to the twenty-first century, high speed 
 transmission lines and satellites are enabling computers to 
 proliferate the whole area of banking. Automated Teller 
 Machines (ATMs) are now in secured areas at the entrance and 
 spread out in malls and kiosks in just about every village, 
 town or city. 

 Customers can now pay utility bills, transfer amounts from one 
 account to another, or check on their loan, mortage or 
 investments. Considering the wide spread use of the internet 
 in millions of homes and offices and more banks hawking their 
 services on the 'WEB', individuals are able to do these things 
 without even leaving their desk or home. Fewer and fewer 
 customers will ever need to visit the inside of banks, unless 
 a document needs to be signed and witnessed by a bank officer. 
 Computers, whether at home, the office, or portable, will be 
 their gateway. 

 ...

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Posted: Sat Dec 07 13:51:14 1996

Hi Gang! Here's my stab at assignment 6

Fontana's Tumble

Prologue

Daybreak, with its tell-tale yellow-orange haze forming an
eerie background to the strips of dull-grey clouds streaming
through it, came slowly creeping out the eastern horizon.

The twin engines hummed steadily, as the sleek Cessna cut
through and over the thin transparent clouds on a heading of
south by south west towards Buffalo. Brad Bartlett stared out
of his right window seat looking past the clouds as they
flashed by. His mind was miles away; back home in Ottawa and
all the troubles brewing there.

"How are we doing for time, Archie?" he asked his pilot,
Archie Duggan.

"We're doin' great. 'Bout a half hour out of Buffalo. This
tail wind is pushing us along quite nicely," Archie responded
but he wasn't much of a talker. He preferred to concentrate on
his work. He'd been flying for Fox Air for over twenty years
and two marriages. Bush flying in Northern Ontario had honed
his skills to a point where he and the machine were one.

"Did you find out why we're using this small plane instead of
the usual jet job I'm more accustomed to? These damn little
things seem to crawl along," Brad asked his pilot.

"All I was able to get out of the ops manager was the jets had
all been booked out. But, don't worry, we'll be there in
plenty of time," Archie replied as he reached for his thermos.
Brad politely declined the offer of a cup and kept up an idle
chatter about his son back home and his Little League team. In
a very short while, he noticed that Archie kept yawning,
rubbing his eyes and shaking his head. "I hope you don't
intend to take a nap just yet," he joked.

"I don't know what's wrong with me. I had a good sleep last
night but I can hardly keep my eyes open," Archie replied.
"I'll be glad to put this baby down and stretch out in the
back room of the operations shack". Brad glanced out his
window and couldn't see anything but puffy patches of clouds
and dark, rough water below.

Suddenly Archie's head bobbed up and down and finally sagged
until his torso strained against his seat belt, his head flat
against the wheel, pushing it forward. The nose of the plane
dipped drastically and wisps of clouds soon opened up to a
vast mass of water rushing up to meet them.

Brad unfastened his seat belt and managed to pull Archie's
limp body towards him, freeing the wheel enough to  pull back
as hard as could. He managed to straighten out the dive enough
that the nose ploughed into the water and the plane
somersaulted a couple of times before coming to a stop before
slowly sinking under the rough waves.


Chapter 1

Jennifer was putting the finishing touches to a newsletter she
had been hired to do on the computer when the phone rang. She
glanced at the number on the call display and recognized it as
Dolores Ramsay, a close friend.

"Hi Dolores! How are you?" she asked cheerfully.

"I'm fine, Jenny. I just called to remind you & Brad about the
corn roast this Saturday. You're still coming aren't you?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world, as long as your husband
doesn't pull another stunt like last year and dunk us all in
the pool," Jennifer laughed.

"I promise he'll be on his best behaviour. By the way, did you
get a call from Brad? Did he get to Buffalo all right?"
Dolores asked.

"No, I haven't heard from him yet," Jennifer answered matter-
of-factly. She was concerned since Brad normally called her as
soon as he checked in to his hotel. But she dismissed her
concern since Brad was a big boy and must have had a good
reason for not calling. Maybe he ran into some other
accountants and they had talked shop over a few beers until it
was too late to call. It then occurred to her he could have
called this morning. That thought irked her some. 

"But... aren't you worried?" Dolores asked. 

"No, not really. He probably ended up drinking in one of those
night spots 'til the wee hours. You know how men are. He'll
probably call today some time," Jennifer said, as much to
reassure her friend as herself. After she had put the phone
back in its cradle, she couldn't help that nagging feeling
that something was definitely wrong. 

The laser printer was quietly spitting out the newsletter when
the phone rang again. She quickly leaned over to grab the
phone thinking maybe it was Brad finally getting around to
call her. She was going to give him a piece of her mind for
making her worry.

When she put the phone to her ear, a weak whisper asked,
"Jennifer?"

"Yes! Who is this?"

"It's Alma...at Comar. I work for your husband here."

"Oh, yes...Alma. I remember you. Can you speak up? I can
hardly hear you."

"I can't talk too loud 'cause I don't want anyone to hear me."

"Why? What's wrong, Alma?" Jennifer asked, puzzled.

"I just overheard Mr. Fontana on the phone having an argument
with someone and Brad's name was mentioned. I couldn't hear it
all but it had something to do with a plane."

"What about the plane?" Jennifer's curiosity was suddenly
stirred. She wanted to know what was going on.

"I'm sorry, Jennifer! That's all I heard. I've got to go now.
Someone's coming!" The phone went dead. Jennifer sat there for
a few seconds not knowing what to make of the strange phone
call. All sorts of scenarios were floating by her mind as she
resumed her work. But her nagging female instincts kept
confusing her trend of thoughts. She caught herself forgetting
what she was doing or what to do next. "Concentrate, girl!"
she told herself. "You have to finish the job at hand." 

At around two o'clock, as she was stapling the finished
newsletter together, the phone on her desk rang. It was
Connie, her next door neighbour. Connie told her to turn on
her TV to the local channel. Jennifer rushed to the living
room, clicked the power button on the remote and tuned it to
Channel Thirteen. There was a newsbreak interruption of the
soap program to announce a small plane was down in Lake
Ontario. The plane was registered to a local charter airline,
but so far no news about survivors. Jennifer stood frozen to
the spot for a moment and then slid slowly into a chair,
dropping the cordless phone to the rug. Through the fog of the
many thoughts rushing through her mind, she could barely hear
Connie's voice on the phone lying at her feet: It couldn't be
Brad's plane; they said a small plane and Brad usually flew on
one of those executive jets: he didn't call as he normally
does: Alma's hush call from the office now was even more
intriquing: Her father's sage advice of not making a rash
decision in a crisis echoed in her mind.

Calmly she picked up the phone from the rug, walked back to
her desk and quickly gave the rolladex wheel a spin, stopping
its roll to pick out a number, and punched it in her phone.


"Good afternoon, University of Ottawa. Can I help you?" the
firm, steady voice asked.

"Could you get a message to Professor Dexter Criden, please?"
Jennifer asked calmly; she didn't want to expose the anxiety
she was feeling.

"I'd be glad to do that for you, Ma'am."

"Ask him to call Jenny as soon as he can, please."

"Does he have your number?"

"Yes, he has. And... thank you." Jennifer calmly put the phone
back in its cradle. She sat numbly at her desk, looking at the
wallboard in front of her with all the bits of papers
hapzardly pinned there but not really seeing anything. A
silent prayer for Brad was occupying her mind at the time.
Before he left for the airport, he had given her a very 
passionate embrace and kiss. She was longing for his arms
around her again. A quiet sob escaped her lips.

 Dex called back about thirty minutes later. "Hi Jenny! You
called?"

"Oh, Dex, I'm so glad you got my message." Jennifer said. 
"There was a news flash a little while ago. Brad's plane went
down somewhere in Lake Ontario. How soon can you get here?"
She was feeling more in control now.

"It's about two thirty now. I'll be there in a half hour. How
are you holding out?" he asked.

"I'm not! Please hurry!" she pleaded.

Dexter Criden was a tall, firmly built man of forty-five with
a sturdy head of dark brown hair greying at the temples, and
pale brown eyes. He was a fitness nut, an eighth grade black
belt, an admirer of modern  paintings with bold, brash colors,
and avid reader of classics which made him the envy of his
peers and attractive to single and married ladies. But it was
his calm, self-assured style of teaching which made him
respected on campus.

Her son, Jason, wasn't home from school yet when Dexter's jeep
pulled into her driveway and she heard his car door slam and 
leather boots clumping up the walk.

She let him in before he even rang the doorbell and almost
collapsed in his arms with heavy sobbing. At last, someone to
whom she could unload her feelings. Connie had come over to be
with her but there were things she couldn't share with her
friend. But the sight of her husband's best friend and
confidant  brought a torrent of tears to her eyes. He led her
to the sofa in the living room and sat beside her. While
Connie was busy in the kitchen preparing a pot of coffee,
Dexter whispered in Jennifer's ear, "We're going to have to do
some talking as soon as your neighbour leaves. Okay?" Jennifer
simply nodded her head amid the sobs. Gradually, she regained
her composure and dabbed the tears from her cheeks and wiped
the blotches of mascara from under her eyes.

By the time Connie left, Jennifer was in better control.
"Forgive me for falling apart like that, Dex; when I heard the
announcement, Brad's last words before he left came out of the
blue and hit me square in the face. I just crumpled. But I'm
better now that you're here."

"That's my girl," Dexter said, putting his hands over hers.
"Jason will be coming in any minute so you'll have to put a
brave front for his sake."

"Yes, of course," Jennifer replied as she got up getting a
hold of herself, straightening out her mussed up hair. She was
wearing her faded jeans and dark blue bulky sweater which
accented her shapely legs but masked her ample bosom. Her
mother had told her, as she was going through her teen
development years, 'be proud of what the Good Lord gave you
but don't flaunt it'. She had the shape and the brains and
tried not to 'flaunt' either one.

"On the way over here, I heard the announcement on the car
radio and there is still no word about survivors, although
they did identify the pilot and Brad," Dexter told her.

"How did they do that? Did they find the plane?" Jennifer
asked.

"They found a part of the fusilage with the markings on it and
I guess they traced it back to this airport," Dexter replied.

"What I can't understand is why they were using a small plane.
Comar usually sends their people on those executive jets
because they're faster and more comfortable," Jennifer put in.

"That's a good point, Jenny. There must have been a reason for
the switch," Dexter replied. "So we have to keep hoping until
we hear differently," Dexter told her.   

"Yes, I know and I'm thankful for that much. But now we know
what we have to do, even if Brad is found alive." At that
utterance, she gave a slight sob but immediately got herself
under control. At that moment, the side door slammed and Jason
yelled out as he was coming through the house, "I'm home! Got
any...". Jason stopped in mid sentence when he noticed Dexter
and his mother standing in the living room, looking pretty
sombre. "Hi Mr. Criden! What's the matter, Mom?"

Jennifer pulled her teen son, a tall, handsome, athletic lad
of fifteen, into her arms and hugged him tightly. Jason was
looking wide eyed at Dexter, wondering what was going on. "We
have some bad news and you're going to have to be a man about
it. You're Dad's plane went down somewhere in Lake Ontario and
so far we haven't heard about survivors. So he may still be
all right," his mother said.

Jason had extricated himself from his mother's embrace and
simply stood there. "Dad?" he said softly as if he couldn't
believe it. After a brief moment, Jason said, "I know he'll be
all right. He's a good swimmer." Even to Jason it seemed like
a silly thing to say, but that's all he could think of at that
moment.

For the next couple of hours, the phone kept ringing: people
from Brad's office, friends and neighbours, even Corrie
Fontana. Fontana's call really irked Jennifer. 'The nerve of
that bastard,' she thought of his phony condolences. Just
because he had turned the meagre family business into a
profitable operation by questionable means, he'd better not
think he's going to get away scot-free. Did he think everyone
was so narrow-minded that they couldn't see what he was up to? 
Brad, as the Accountant, certainly saw the questionable
invoicing patterns, the transfers to off-shore accounts and
other things not normally part of a plant operation. He was
doing something about it. She wondered if Fontana caught on
and decided to get rid of him.  

She told Dexter of Corrie's call. "If I find out he had
anything to do with that plane crash, that son-of-a-bitch will
live to regret it," she said as she slammed her fist into the
table top so hard she winced at the pain. She was thankful
that Jason had gone to his room and didn't see her in her
fury.

Dexter finally put in, "I know how you feel, Jenny, and don't
worry, we'll get to the bottom of this. I think it's time to
give my buddy, Detective Nick Pritchly a call and we get
things rolling. You still have the disks and documentation
Brad gave you?" 

"Oh, you bet I have!" Jennifer snapped. "I've entrusted them
to someone we can all trust until the time comes we need
them."

"Great! Leave them where they are for now. Pritchly will
certainly want to see them later. But, we're going to have to
physically tie Fontana into all this before we can make a case
stick in court. I don't want to simply get him for money
laundering. But if he had anything to do with the plane
accident, we want something solid to pin on him," Dexter said
as he punched out Pritchly's number.  

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