When you come to China and meet an expat who has been in China for some time refrain from asking the generic “so what’s life like here? any surprises?” Be more specific and slice right through the heart by asking “what’s a trip to the bank like?” All foreigners here not living out of a suitcase will have a story or two. Or ten.

Here is my most recent one. I bank at ICBC (Industrial and Commercial Bank of China) because it was the only bank that my company had automatic payroll deposits for and whose credit card I had to use to book my flights. Pretty much all banks here have a bad reputation for customer service and ICBC is the well deserved leader in the bad reputation race. I had things pretty much set up so that I never, ever had to visit a branch because of stories previously told. But my luck ran out and I needed to visit a branch not for one transaction but three. The first transaction was to get my ATM card replaced because I lost it, the second transaction was to transfer money to my bank account in the US, and the third was to get my renewed credit card. So kind of like three stories in one; bear with me.

In mid December I lost my ATM card. We made three trips to the branch to get it replaced. For the first trip the line was so long we called the Bank’s service number and they put an immediate block on the card also supposedly locking the account it was tied to. Easy enough. They said we needed to wait a week and then we could go to the branch and if the card was still lost we could get another one. So a week or so later we went to our local branch. To see a teller you get a ticket and when they call your number you go to the designated window. It can be a bit of a wait and Yang, Elisa, and I settled in. They called out number 62 and Yang immediately got up and walked to the counter. The problem was it was already showing 63 and there was someone sitting there. It had been no more than 10 or 15 seconds from the time the number was called to the time we got there. Yang stated her case and when the teller said he had waited plenty of time for 62 before switching to 63. This is when Yang lost her temper which she very, very seldom does in public (or private for that matter). I lost my temper too but I cannot converse when I lose my temper so I just stood next to the old woman who had jumped the line. A bank manager eventually escorted us to another window and after 30 minutes of paperwork we were told we have to come back in another week since the account had a non-trivial amount of money in it. So we go in a week and this time Yang gamed the system a bit by saying I needed to pay off the USD on my dual currency credit card which got us into a shorter line. An hour later I had a new ATM card.

So that was the first transaction. Outside of it taking three weeks from the time I lost my card to the time I could use an ATM again and the line jumping conspiracy, things went pretty smoothly. For my second transaction, I needed to transfer some money to my account in the US to fund the kids educational accounts and what not. The RMB is not a free currency and the government places some restrictions on its movement. Once such restriction is you cannot move currency outside of the country without some kind of backing evidence. The two I know about is you show evidence that you had brought X dollars into the country and then you can transfer up to X dollars out again. The other is that you earned the money in China and paid taxes on it here, which is my case. Microsoft HR has put together a simple 17 step process to get the proof and do the transfer with steps 11-14 reading something like “black magic”, “black box”, and “contact hr for details about this step”. Of the hundreds (thousands?) of foreigners who’ve worked here I know maybe one who has successfully used this process and he did it as much as proof theorem exercise as anything (kind of like replying to the Nigerian royalty who promises you millions of dollars if you just reply). Fortunately there is a workaround; one that HR even recommends because the process is a bit of pain to them as well especially with the foreigners complaining about it every step of the way. The work around is simple, get a Chinese friend to transfer the money for you since they are allowed to transfer up to $50K per year. More than 50K, more friends. In the past we’ve used Yang’s mom, Yang’s dad, and this time our younger ayi who is literate and can handle the paperwork (Yang herself is ineligible because she had to give up her Chinese citizenship when she became Canadian).

We get to the bank around 9:45 and Yang tried the same optimization as with my ATM card – go to the shorter international customers line. This time we got shot down and was told we had to go to the main line and do our RMB business first. This meant an additional 30 minute wait. As our number – 82 -- got close I decided to stand and not let a line jumper beat us this time. Our number flashes and like musical chairs the young man standing in front of me takes the seat in front of the teller. My teller. I am about to say something but since I don’t speak Chinese there is not much I can say. Yang is there and the teller doesn’t even try to explain and she just tells us to use the next counter which has also just freed up. (the line jumper had a large woman’s purse and he proceeded to pull out stacks and stacks of cash to deposit). When we turned to the teller in the next stall, it was none other than the one who screwed us on our previous visit. He looked a bit nervous as Yang spoke to him. His first reaction was to tell us to go to the international teller – a common tactic for tellers here is to avoid all work by passing the buck to someone else – which Yang quickly pushed back. We had 30 minutes of paperwork to do with the teller and then my money was transferred into our ayi’s brand new savings account. Another ticket and another wait and then we were back in front of the international teller. Yang had filled out the wire transfer document while we had waited earlier but it turned out to be like diffusing a bomb.  For example the field that said “amount in words” had to be written in Chinese and our Beijing address had to be written in English. Yang had done the exact opposite. So another form, more paperwork, and we were out of the ICBC branch by lunch time. Epilogue: The called Yang later and said some more information is still require.

My final transaction was to get a new credit card for my expired one. When we visited the branch for my ATM replacement they said credit card renewal was only handled over the phone. When we called they said that I needed to visit the card center in person to get the new card. So fine, what’s one more visit. I wanted to get the card yesterday but Yang was busy so I thought I’d try on my own. I called the English line for the bank and asked for the address of the card center. I got the general area but not a specific address that I could understand. I had Yang’s mom call and try to get the location but she could not navigate the phone system complex menu system. Eventually I found it in Google maps and headed out on my own. Three subway lines and an hour and a half later I found the card center and it was closed. At least I now knew the location and the hours. Today after the money transfer Yang and I started to drive to the card center but the traffic was so bad we gave up. After lunch Yang headed to tennis and I decided to try the card center on my own. I got there and I guess they do a lot of renewals so they knew what I wanted. My teller spoke no English and I spoke even less Chinese but somehow we managed and a short 60 minutes later I had my new card. It expires in 2016. Which is, I hope, the next time I will need to visit a branch.