You are a card, a number

Plight of the human credit card holder today as visualized by AI

Do you love your credit card? I did!

Way back then it helped me buy immediate requirements for the house that I could hardly pay the rent for. Back then when I needed to travel to earn a living, it got me tickets at a discount.

Decades after we had started living together, some weeks ago, I found a few strange charges. Because I was not travelling as frequently as I used to, I was being penalized for not utilizing my benefits accruing from other purchases.

Up the levels of indifference

As I could not figure it out, I wrote to them. When they responded, I found myself climbing the hierarchy of customer care with each response.
​
Every email ran into some 15 paragraphs (yes, I counted). After the third or fourth response, I became more adept at quickly spotting that single short sentence that directly answered my question or addressed my issue.

The card was to expire soon. Heart-breaking as it was, I suggested they ought not to bother renewing the card. That was not possible, or so suggested a response. Nothing to do with the silly heart but some technical issue.

Then they told me the charges had been reversed. I did not want to strain my heart further by asking why they had bothered to charge me in the first place.

So, half-way into my first month after that card expired, I called. Probably, I expected tearful cheers when I told them I wanted to renew. The voice was matter of fact: “We sent your card last month. But your address could not be located. So, it came back. Do you want us to send it again?” Huh? I did not think the voice really bothered that how far back my association with that card went. It was the immediate transaction that was on the screen.

A couple of days later, the courier messaged the card was on the way. All’s well, that ends well? Ha!

The courier guy is known. Did you ever attempt delivering the same card before and no one was at home? No, he said. This was the first time he was delivering this card. Surely, the bank must know better? They were sure the card went back. “Banks, cards,” he mysteriously smirked.

Here, take two

The reason behind the smirk became clearer the following week, when I got another message. My card was on the way and delivery would be attempted on that very day. What? Again?

Went through the steps to establish my identity with customer care yet again. Yes, I had accepted and activated the card precisely seven days ago. No, they never sent a second card. 

Soon, the courier friend is at the door again, calmly entering the code to cancel the delivery.

“You are fortunate. You got only two cards. The next address I am going to I will be delivering the tenth card. Do you know we get paid less than 10 rupees for every card we deliver? And we are fined 5,000 if we fail to deliver for whatever reason?”

As he politely refused the glass of water I offered that hot afternoon and walked away, I did not even bother to understand what was happening. My intelligence was too real and ancient for that.

Are we using so much of coded intelligence that our native thinking is getting artificial? Or is the bug in the thinking that I am anything more than the number embedded on the piece of plastic?