Dirty Bankers?

The banking industry bore the brunt of an onslaught of its lending practices by BBC's Panorama programme last night.

It appears that the cynical views of modern society have not yet reached the public's perception of banks. They must be honourable and have a duty of care to customers. Not doing so should prove a shock to the masses.

Really?

I'm pretty sure that should I give my bank the chance they would happily own me. Nothing vicious about it, purely business: the ultimate business in fact, owning 100% of your customer's available funds. Everyone has their magic number, for me it was 20%. When I owed 20% of my salary on credit cards and overdrafts that was enough for me. They had far much more say in my life than I wanted them to have and so I made a drastic effort to start paying it back.

You'll have to excuse me for being unsympathetic but there are two sides of stupidity that collide together when a bank hands out too much money and a person accepts it.

1. That the bank expects to get their money back.
2. That the person doesn't expect their life to be an unmanageable living hell when they take money they know full well they won't be able to pay back.

I'd wager that the costs involved in claiming money from the dead debtor makes for a poor ROI. It is up to both parties to own up to the problem.
Banks should indeed have a moral responsibility to not push customers over the edge and customers themselves should know better than to put themselves in the situation.