An end to living by numbers?

There's help at hand for those of you who might be ...er...a little forgetful when it comes to remembering your Personal Identification Number or PIN for you bank or credit card.

A scheme that's on trial in two French towns recognising customers' fingerprints and allowing them to make purchases "biometrically".

I lost my wallet recently.

Well that's not entirely true. I left it on the roof of my car and drove off: not an uncommon practice as far as I'm concerned with my mind invariably floating somewhere out there, seemingly unattached to events happening in everyday life.

Luckily it was found by a couple, although in the meantime I had cancelled my cards.

Another not so unusual occurrence sadly - cancelling my cards or asking for a replacement.

Lost, stolen, pirated - I've been there all too frequently, every time calling the bank or the card provider immediately and then waiting patiently for a new one to be issued.

And every new card of course has meant memorising yet another PIN number - one of the proverbial banes of my life.

I mean, even when the four-digit code is well and truly stamped in the recesses of that lump of grey matter that passes for a brain,  there are still all-too-frequent moments when blankness descends.

Those moments of far-from-blissful solitude at the supermarket checkout for example,  ready to punch in the required number when... nothing.

It's hard to fathom exactly why.

I'm usually great at remembering numbers; rattling off 'phone numbers (apart from my own of course) or birthdays without a problem but PIN - forget it.

With my last, now sadly-departed, card I thought I would be clever.

You know how each of the 101 French départements is numbered more-or-less alphabetically: 01 for Ain, 02 for Aisne, 03 for Allier...all the way up to 976 for Mayotte (don't ask - otherwise the digression will invade the post completely).

Well I thought I would try some sort of mnemonic to remember my PIN by breaking the four digits up into two pairs and linking them to two of the départements.

The lucky couple (?) were Saône-et-Loire - 71,  and Morbihan - 56 ( actually they weren't , but I'm just using them to illustrate how I went about memorising the real numbers).

Except of course I invariably kept muddling them up - and had on more than one occasion to take a look at my mobile 'phone where they were cleverly saved...although I could never remember where.

While I wait for my replacement carte bleue and PIN - 10 working days and counting apparently - Amex has been far faster.

It plopped through the letter box just days after the last one was reported lost, but...Aaaaaarrrrrrrggggggghhh! It too now comes with a PIN.

Another number to forget.

So it was with more than a little interest that the following story caught my eye recently; a new method of paying by card which recognises customers' fingerprints and allows them to make purchases "biometrically".

It's already being piloted in the northern town of Villeneuve d'Ascq and later this month will also be tested in the southwestern town of Angoulême.

All right so it might all be a bit Big Brother for some people out there who don't like the idea  that banks could also potentially have our digital fingerprints on record as well as any other information they already hold.

But, if successful, it'll do away with the need for a PIN and thereby be one heck of an aid for those of us who have problems in a world in which it's becoming increasingly necessary to be "Living by numbers"

Cue for a Eurotrash song from the 80s with a great intro from British DJ Steve Wright when the group, New Musik, appeared on Top of the Pops.

Have a great weekend.

BNP Paribas - a bank without money

So, this is the (true) story of a man (just for argument's sake let's call him Jean-Pierre) who tried to make a withdrawal from his bank but couldn't because, in the words of the clerk, "We don't actually have any money here."

The (in)action took place at one of the Courbevoie branches of BNP Paribas.

BNP Paribas (screenshot from commercial)

"The bank for a changing world" as it proudly boasts on its website, is "a European leader in global banking and financial services and one of the best rated banks in the world."

With over 2,000 branches in France it is the country's largest.

Courbevoie, in the northwestern suburbs of Paris and one of "the best places to live" (apparently) in the Île-de-France region which comprises the capital and the surrounding metropolitan area, isn't actually Jean-Pierre's home.

It's where he spends his weekdays as he works in Paris, returning to his home in the southwest of France for the weekends.

And it's in the southwest that, just over a year ago, he opened an account with BNP because, well to be quite frank, it offered the best terms.

He needed a loan for renovation work and the local branch manager was only too willing to offer him one at a good rate and without requiring him to move his main account from a competitor bank, Crédit agricole.

Jean-Pierre's salary continued to be paid on to his Crédit agricole account in Courbevoie for which he had an ATM card but he made sure he had more than enough on both his current and savings account at the BNP to cover any emergencies that might crop up.

It was, in a sense, an account purely meant to meet expenses to his main home: although he had a cheque book, he didn't have an ATM card.

"You don't really need one if you're not going to make withdrawals," the manager had told him when he had opened it.

"And besides if you do need money at any time, you can just drop into any of our branches throughout the country and get some."

Excellent, thought Jean-Pierre at the time. "It's not an account I'm going to be using that much. My main one is with Crédit agricole and I don't have to meet the costs of having a card I'm not going to need."

Oh yes he was - and still is - a frugal man.

Except, as you've already grasped, that's not exactly how it all worked out.

Because when Jean-Pierre went along to a Courbevoie branch of BNP this week to take out some money he needed to make a cash payment (with receipt - it has to be added) he was informed politely that, "Sorry we cannot give you anything. We don't actually have any money here."

A bank without money? Now that was something novel.

Well maybe not in these cash-strapped times.

There then followed one of those almost surreal conversations during which the clerk said that if Jean-Pierre had been a client of that particular branch then he could have requested an ATM card allowing him to make an on-the-spot withdrawal.

That would have taken time, money and paperwork, and anyway wasn't really a solution to his immediate needs.

"What about the other branches in Courbevoie?" Jean-Pierre asked, knowing there were at least two more close by.

"Do they have any...er...money?"

He tried hard not to snort with incredulity at the preposterous nature of his question.

"No, they don't," was the response."

"Your best bet, if you need some cash immediately, is to try to find a BNP branch in Paris that has some. I'm sure there is one. I just don't know where it is."

Now that's the kind of sound financial advice anyone wants to hear from their bank.

So dumbfounded, Jean-Pierre left and headed straight to the nearest branch of Credit Agricole - where - what do you know - they actually did have cash on the premises.

The end.

Rachida Brakni's banking dilemma

Do you think the French actress Rachida Brakni had any problems with the recent remarks made by her husband Eric Cantona?

Rachida Brakni (screenshot from LCL commercial)

You remember surely.

Cantona is the former French international footballer who called on people to withdraw all their money from their bank accounts.

The suggestion from the newly-discovered "political philosopher" (as one BBC report dubbed him) came during an informal interview with journalists in October.

His idea was that rather than taking to the streets to demonstrate, people could go to the local branch of their bank and withdraw all their money, "Causing the banking system to crumble".

A peaceful protest of sorts to send a message to the whole banking system and financial services which, as far as Cantona was concerned, were at the root of much of the current misery in the world; homelessness, poverty, injustice.



It was a message that quickly found its way on to the Net with a campaign beginning, a date fixed for the "revolution" and financial experts and politicians wading in to urge caution.

The day of protest (December 7) came and went.

The world survived.

But wait.

What about that initial question as to whether Brakni had a problem with her husband's remarks.

After all she must know the guy pretty well. They've been married for the past three years and the couple have a one-year-old son, Emir.

The question has to be asked though because...well what was that commercial the 33-year-old actress appeared in for a couple of weeks back in April this year?

Oh yes. That's right.

It was for one of France's biggest banks LCL (Le Crédit Lyonnais) encouraging people to apply for mortgages - of all things.

Rachida Brakni dazns une publicité LCL Vidéo jeanmarcmorandini sélectionnée dans Pub

Ho hum.

Dinner time in the Cantona-Brakni household must have made for interesting conversation.

French bank reveals Santa doesn't exist!

The French bank Crédit Mutuel is in hot water with parents after a commercial it aired revealed that Father Christmas doesn't exist.

The spot only lasts 20 seconds, but it has been the subject of controversy for the best part of a week.

It features a father offering up his adult son some "sound" financial advice, insisting that banks touch a commission whenever they carry out transactions on behalf of their clients.

"I have some bad news for you," the father says to his son right at the beginning of the commercial.

"Father Christmas doesn't really exist."

Crédit Mutuel; "Father Christmas doesn't really exist" (snapshot from commercial)

All right, all right. So nothing too controversial in that. After all he doesn't really exist that is in any tangible sense (apologies to those of you who've just had a myth destroyed).

He is of course a figure used by parents to...well an explanation isn't really necessary, surely.

The problem, apparently as far as many parents in France are concerned, comes not with the commercial or its message so much as with its placement; as it was broadcast immediately before the animated Walt Disney film "Ratatouille" aired on TF1 a week last Sunday.

It is of course a movie aimed primarily at children, and plenty of them were reportedly in front of the box eagerly awaiting the start when their illusions were shattered.

And even though some might think parents were overreacting, a psychologist insisted that finding out in such a way that Santa doesn't really exist could have a detrimental effect on young children.

"Being told so suddenly that Father Christmas is imaginary could be viewed (by children) as a punishment or a lie," children's psychologist Sonia Ouali told the French website Rue89.

"Denying this imaginary figure (in such a manner) is like taking away part of childhood."

Crédit Mutuel's initial reaction was to try to play down the growing storm of protest.

"It would be a mistake to withdraw the commercial," its communications director, Bernard Sadoun, told Rue89.

"The whole controversy has been taken totally out of context."

But in an effort to diffuse mounting criticism, including a Facebook group protesting the commercial, it subsequently contributed to the debate by posting its own message in threads in which it promised it would "only air the spot after 8;30pm to reduce its impact on young children."

Pub Scandale : Le père Noël n'existe pas Vidéo jeanmarcmorandini sélectionnée dans Pub

Rachida Dati's "pornographic" economic analysis

It happens to the best of us confusing a word or a simple slip of the tongue.

But when you're a politician such as Rachida Dati and still in the public eye (in spite of her claims that she has never sought the limelight - hide the guffaws please) a simple mistake can give everyone a jolly good belly laugh.

Rachida Dati, screenshot from Dimanche + clip

Such has been the case since Sunday afternoon when the former justice minister and now Member of the European Parliament was a guest on the afternoon current affairs programme Dimanche + on Canal +.

Sharp-eared viewers probably couldn't quite believe their ears as Dati turned an otherwise potentially rather dry subject "foreign investment funds" to one with sexual overtones as she inadvertently threw oral sex into her analysis.

"De plus en plus, ces fonds d'investissements étrangers n'ont pour seul objectif que la rentabilité financière à des taux excessifs," she said.

"Quand je vois certains qui réclament une rentabilité à 20-25%, avec une fellation quasi nulle..."

For those of you who might have missed it, or whose French is a bit ropey, the clue lies in the last five words, "avec un fellation quasi nulle..." and the French for inflation "inflation" and fellatio "fellation".

So what Dati actually said gave her response quite a different meaning from the one intended namely, "Increasingly, these foreign investment funds have only one objective, the financial return to excessive levels.

"When I see some of them looking for returns of 20 or 25 percent, at a time when fellatio is almost non-existent..."

Dati's oral blunder quickly made it on to the Net (you can see it here at 12-13 seconds) and raised more than just a smile in many quarters.


Lapsus: Dati confond "inflation" et... "fellation"
envoyé par LePostfr. - L'actualité du moment en vidéo.

But at least she has had the sense of humour to shrug off the incident with aplomb insisting that of course she hadn't confused the two words.

"I was just speaking a little too fast," she said on national radio on Monday morning.

"You can see that (when you look at the clip)", she added.

"But hey, if it makes everyone laugh..."

Man's mammoth credit card debt wasn't fraud

A Frenchman on supplementary income has been cleared of fraud after running up debts of almost €180,000 with his bank.

The 35-year-old had been receiving Revenu de Solidarité Active (RSA), a supplementary payment for those working but on low incomes, when he obtained a credit card and a cheque book from one of France's largest retail banks Crédit Agricole towards the end of 2008.

As the financial daily, Les Echos, reports he quickly totted up debts of €138,500 using his credit card for 1,351 operations.

He also wrote out €40,000-worth of cheques, all of them uncovered.

It took the bank two months to realise what had happened and it was only in February 2009 that it cancelled his card and filed a law suit accusing the man of fraud.

But as the national daily Aujourd'hui en France-Le Parisien reports, at Thursday's hearing in the eastern French town of Saint-Dié his lawyer Gérard Welzer argued that there had been no evidence of fraud.

"The case is once again evidence of an alarming failure by a bank," he said pointing out that Crédit Agricole had been slow to react to the quick accumulation of a debt by someone in a "precarious" financial situation.

"Did my client use another person's card or wear a false moustache or wig?" he asked.

"No. And in the eyes of the law using a credit card without having sufficient funds to cover transactions doesn't constitute fraud."

While the bank wasn't present at the hearing, it will be recovering the money, albeit in instalments, as the man has been ordered to make monthly payments of €150 for the next 77 years.

French bank blows whistle on illegal immigrant

Last weekend Yaro S. as he's being referred to in the French media, turned up at a branch of the bank Société Générale in the Parisian suburb of Boulogne to withdraw money from his account.

As is always the case for anyone wanting to make withdrawals, the cashier asked him to present some form of identity, and Yaro handed over his carte de séjour or residence permit.

The only problem was that it was a fake one. And on realising that, the clerk informed the police and went a step further by closing the doors of the bank and ensuring that Yaro was unable to make a getaway until they had arrived.

The 41-year-old Mauritanian was taken into detention and now faces deportation back to his country of origin.

The fake ID according to La Cimade, a French non-governmental organisation that offers legal assistance to undocumented immigrants, was exactly the same piece of identity Yaro had given when opening the account in the first place back in 2005.

Moreover Yaro, who has been living in France since 2002 and has been working in the kitchen of a restaurant, has a request pending with French authorities to regularise his status as a resident.

Now to some reading this, the actions of the bank staff might smack of "denunciation" and indeed unions have criticised any behaviour by bank employees, which might to many seem overzealous and give the appearance of them wishing "to participate actively in the political process of checking identity papers."

That is not the role of staff, but as a union official, Michel Marchet, points out, there is something of a dilemma.

"When they (the employees) realise a fake ID is being presented, they are required to report it," he says.

"It's not necessarily taking part in tracking down illegal immigrants, but an obligation to ensure that there is no fraud or money laundering occurring, something for which fake identities are often used," he adds.

Société Générale's position on what happened runs along the line of "it being the responsibility of the bank to ensure that the person withdrawing money is also the one to whom the account belongs".

But it neatly sidesteps the issue that the only way Yaro was able to open the account in the first place back in 2005 was by using the very same ID that became his undoing last weekend.

For La Cimade though, what has happened to Yaro is part of a disturbing trend here in France.

"This case is symptomatic of a growing tendency to 'inform' (on illegal immigrants)," it says, pointing out that over the summer three other cases of illegal immigrant being denounced have succeeded.