Statistics, Facts, & Such

In 1948 there were less than 10,000 personal bankruptcies in the United States. In 1981 there were 360,000. In 1989 there were 725,000! In ninety percent of the bankruptcies in 1989, no property was lost by the debtor. Who takes the loss? The creditor...in most cases, the financial institution.

Almost 50% of all personal bankruptcies are caused by credit card abuse.

Approximately seventy-one percent of all people employed by financial institutions are females.

If all the financial institutions in the United States were to do away with all their exempt lists, IRS estimates that the number of Currency Transaction Reports would jump from the 6 million filed last year to over 21 million.

There is no loss limit in the United Kingdom on lost or stolen credit or debit cards. Cardholders are responsible for all losses until they inform their banks. The British financial industry has recommended limiting customer liability to $100.

Time management experts say managers are interrupted every eight minutes. They also tell us that 90% of what is filed will never be looked at again. (Ed. Maybe because it's misfiled?!)

Japan, the home of the world's largest and most powerful banking institutions, has 20 official bank holidays a year-including September 15 which is "Respect for the Aged Day." Spain has 26 bank holidays a year. But they are still behind the Federation of Malaysia, which has 36 bank holidays a year!

In Albania banks, teller windows are open only four hours a day-from 7:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.-Monday through Saturday.

In trying to convince financial institutions to put more ATM's in post offices, Gordon Morrison, assistant postmaster general said, "More than 6 million transactions are conducted every day nationwide in postal lobbies. Almost every household in the United States has a member that makes a visit to a postal lobby on a monthly basis."

Copyright © 1990 Bankers' Hotline. Originally appeared in Bankers' Hotline, Vol. 1, No. 12, 12/90