A banking miracle

As the cash machine swallowed our one and only credit card I stood transfixed.
No card, no cash was all I could think. All we had left were a few hundred kwacha (latest exchange rate is around 280 kwacha to the pound), a Maestro card that is worse than useless in Malawi and forty euros left over from our European tour.
The bank had just closed its doors, it was Friday afternoon and we were due to travel to Blantyre at 7.00 am the next morning.
My panic got worse. No credit card meant we had no way of paying our hotel bill. How would we pay for meals? It was 3.15 pm and we hadn’t even had lunch yet. Now the prospect of dinner was receding as fast as my pulse was racing.
“What happened?” asked Nigel, clearly trying hard not to panic.
“A message came up about the card reader or something, then our card disappeared,” I said.
I ignored him when he asked what that meant. How would I know, I can’t even balance the cash in my purse.
Then I saw it.
A notice next to the cash machine which read: If you have technical difficulties with this ATM please call the National Bank of Malawi on 01831485.
So I did.
“How can I help you madame,” asked Tanya. I explained what happened.
“Oh, so your card was captured. Where are you now?” she asked.
“Standing outside the front door of the bank,” I said.
“Let me call you back shortly, I will get this fixed,” she said cheerfully and hung up.
Nigel looked at me. I looked at him. “What are the chances of getting our card back?” he asked.
“None”, I said, “it was a call centre”.
Then a miracle happened. The bank door opened, we were ushered inside and told to wait for the manager. Note the manager of the capital city’s biggest branch. Not a teller, or a salesperson, or the cleaner. The manager.
He appeared, laughing. “I have had a call from our call centre in Blantyre. Your card is stuck in our machine. Let me get it out for you.”
He called an assistant and she cheerfully extracted our wayward credit card from the back of the machine.
“Thank you so much, zikomo kambiri, zikomo, zikomo,” I spluttered.
Now we could eat and pay our hotel bill. We may even have a Malawi gin or two.
As our taxi approached the hotel, my mobile phone rang. It was Tanya.
“Hello, I was just checking you got your card okay, and have a good weekend,” she said cheerfully.
A call centre that called back. I was stunned into silence.
Sir Fred Goodwin et al please note.
A bank that helps its customers instead of trying to sell them financial products they don’t need and usually can’t afford. What a novel idea.