I mentioned previously that I was laid off from my job several weeks ago, and last week I finally saw the first of my unemployment benefits from the State of Texas. Considering the purpose of the benefits is to help cover basic living expenses such as mortgage payments and the like during periods of joblessness, I was shocked to find out that you could only receive benefits on a Visa debit card issued by Chase. Yes, the braintrust in Austin decided it was a good idea to distribute benefits in such a way that you have to jump through hoops to pay most regular expenses like a mortgage or a car payment, but you can easily go and buy more useless crap at your local Best Buy. Friggin’ brilliant! I wonder how much in political contributions it cost Chase to get that sweetheart deal.
Thankfully the card does allow for a single free cash withdrawal for each period in which benefits are paid, so I drove down to the bank and had them withdraw the cash from the card and deposit it in my checking account so I could do something with it. Thankfully we don’t live paycheck to paycheck so the extra time it takes to get down to the bank and transfer the funds is nothing more than an aggravation, but I feel bad for the person who needs money in their checking account to pay the mortgage and then gets a stupid card they have to go convert to cash and then deposit in their account. Why can’t we have direct deposit like nearly every employer in America and even Social Security recipients? Of course don’t get me started on the actual amount of the benefit, which is less than a quarter of what my last salary was.
Anyway, sorry for the lack of updates last week. We traveled back to Louisiana for my brother-in-law’s wedding the previous weekend and got back home mid-week. Of course there is always a bunch of stuff to catch up on after being out. The job search is still chugging along as I have arranged three interviews for this week and one for next week. Unfortunately no offers yet, although I did hear from a company I previously interviewed with that they may want to bring me on in a different capacity than what I interviewed for. It will probably be a few weeks before anything happens there, and once something does happen it is questionable whether the position will be at an appropriate level.
Also on the subject of jobs we got word late last week that my mother got laid off from her job, although it was not completely unexpected. She worked for a mortgage servicing company that specialized in delinquent loans, and their business was very dependent on being able to finance the purchases of loans with credit. Since the credit markets completely seized up, they have essentially been in wind-down mode for about the last year and many of my mother’s coworkers had already been shown the door. Her search will be a bit trickier since she didn’t complete her college degree and she was compensated extremely well in her last position, plus the market isn’t that hot where she is looking.
Now THAT is 83 levels of dumb. Of course, I was able to find several press releases from both TWC and Chase extolling the virtues of this system and how the claimant won’t need to wait for a check in the mail, and how the unbanked will now be able to use their benefits without extra check cashing fees. The savings of cashing fees will come in handy once people start running into the whole litany of fees with which Chase can now slap them. Direct deposit would be so much easier, as you mention, but almost no agency in the state does that. THHSC operates Lone Star, and the OAG has been pushing a debit card over checks (but at least they offer direct deposit) for years.