$1500!!! FFS. It included 6.5 hours of labor, which is silly, but hey.

Submitted a claim. Oddly, it's a relief, mostly because it's so far over the deductible.

I went to the EZPass website a few days ago. I manually topped it up by $25, then switched the card it was using for automatic top-ups because I don't regularly keep money in my personal checking account. Fine, right?

Nope. Somehow, I managed to trigger the auto-top-up anyway (when your balance goes below $10, it automatically triggers a top-up) and it used my old card and sent it into overdraft. I only noticed it today when I checked my bank--I WENT to check my EZ-Pass balance Friday but the system was down for scheduled maintenance for 3 days. I finally got in, and the primary card is correct. I have no idea why it charged my old one, and how I triggered the top-up (we did use the pass the day after, maybe it took time to update...)

So, I now have $54 on E-ZPass and a $35 bounced transaction fee. Grr.

Following on from a discussion elsewhere, I did some comparison shopping.

1 large can Enfamil Lipil powder - $27.
1 pack Aptamil First powder - £8. ($13)

Both packs make 196 oz of formula.

So much for all the formula giveaways making things cheaper--everyone else is paying for them. (Plus the advertising.)

Neil's new accounts have popped up in my online banking, so I guess I am on them!

That would be Social Security. "Your card will be there within a week". LIE. It's not. (I got a replacement with my new name; Neil got an initial one and neither one of us has it. His is more important since at least I have the number.)

Without the SS#, you can't get a bank account, driver's license, or job. Grrr.

(Language off note: The official Spanish name of Social Security is Seguro Social, which really means "social insurance". I wonder why they didn't use Seguridad Social, the literal translation and the name used in several Spanish speaking countries.)

Oh, and First Direct have fraud-blocked me again. Sigh. I need to write a check for Aliza's Child Health Plus, and for this amount the easiest method was to take out cash and deposit it. Now I can't do it till Tuesday as it's a bank holiday on Monday (Columbus Day). They're

Speaking of checks, HSBC made a slight error. My ZIP+4 is xxxxx-x282. They put it down (and I didn't give it to them, so it's not a question of me failing to notice the error when I checked the account details, though if their software generated the +4 I might not have noticed anyway) as x285. I'm not sure I can be bothered to have them fix the error. I don't think anyone ever checks the +4. Plus i checked (Google maps doesn't have the +4 database! Mapquest does, though) and that's basically across the street.

Just got the repair estimate back:

Necessary Items:
Crystal $118.00 Necessary
Dial $537.00 Necessary
Hands $0.00 Necessary
Gasket $0.00 Necessary
Complete Service $396.00 Necessary
Total Necessary Items:$1,051.00

Which is not something I can really afford to swing, and which comes perilously close to the cost of replacing my watch. Which I can't afford either, certainly not like this one (my watch is a Raymond Weil Parsifal, and I love it). And even if I could... I've had this watch for 15 years. It has a lot of sentimental value.

One area where I will freely admit that America is behind is banking. And my bank is a prime example. I've banked with a local savings bank for years, because they're cheap--no maintenance fees. However:

1) I ordered new checks. When I called, I said I hadn't had new checks in several years; they said OK, you need to be transferred to the company that does them. So I was. I ordered. 3 weeks, no checks, no charge deducted. Call up. Order was cancelled, no explanation, need to call bank. I do. They say "oh, this is effectively a new order, you need to do it in branch". WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME THIS 3 WEEKS AGO??

2) I ask for my BIC and IBAN codes so I can transfer money from the UK. They can't provide them. A little quizzing reveals that they can get money internationally--they do it through JP Morgan Chase--but I just need to give them my routing number and regular bank account number. She didn't seem to understand that NatWest won't know what the fuck to do with them--they need BIC/IBAN or SWIFT codes.

I said fuck it. I'm going over to HSBC later, because they can deal with international issues. I'll pay fees, at least for a bit (even basic checking is $3/mo with a transaction limit) but I don't care at this point. Only sucky thing will be that I'll be back down to starting at check #101. Not that this matters so much these days since I'm hardly ever in a position where I'm in a store and need to write a check, the usual situation where you hit a "check must be at least #300" situation. But still. I was looking forward to a new box of checks so I could start at 300 and be able to write in-store checks! Just the principle.

I tried getting some money out the other day and got declined. Neil got a fraud alert letter. I called First Direct to get them to fix my card. I verify my security details and get passed on to fraud. Some idiot starts giving me this whole yada yada explanation. I know what happened. I forgot to call the bank and I hit the automated fraud system. I cut her off--I don't care, I want it fixed. She says she can't. What the fuck? You can't tell the fraud alert system that the cardholder is actually out of the country? I went nuclear and asked for the supervisor. (I'm 99% sure, by the accents, that I was transferred to India.) She goes through the same thing, no, they can't fix it. I'm incredulous. "You can't lift the fraud alert?" "Well we can but it will just happen again"

I mean, WTF? Do they expect their customers to never go abroad and forget to call? The almighty computer system, it will not permit it!

I'm not broke and I can get money another way but this was just bullshit.

Right before we leave, the pound falls! It was below $1.90 at one point...

The US government is annoying. It requires all citizens to file and pay taxes, regardless of where they are resident.

In practice, I am required to pay nothing: the US and UK have a dual taxation treaty, so if I earn money here, I don't have to pay US tax on it. (Moreover, there's an $80K exemption for foreign earned income.)

However, I still have to file. Well, sort of. See, last year, my income was less than the limit, so theoretically I don't... except you need all your back tax returns for your I-864. Since I'm technically a foreign resident, married filing separately, I have to use a 1040 long form. I have to fill out 2 pages of junk, mostly with zeroes. I also had to do 2 back returns I kept forgetting to file *cough* (Oh, the IRS doesn't care. I don't owe them, they don't owe me. I've heard of expats forgetting for years. The IRS only cares if you owe them money.)

Next year's taxes are going to be a nightmare (income/savings in 2 countries). I'm getting an accountant. (OK, my mother's cousin Sidney the CPA. World's Most Boring Man.)