Robin Brown

So let me get this straight. To access that money – my own money – that’s hanging around collecting dust in this Paypal account, I have to:

• Print off the form, input all my bank details
• Find out the amounts of cash Paypal have deposited in my account
• Photocopy my driving licence
• Locate a fax machine – a method of communication virtually no-one uses any more
• Fax all highly sensitive information drivel to a fax number in the US

How am I supposed to know where all this sensitive information is going? Why can’t I use this bank account in the first place? Where can I find a fax machine? What if I don’t have a printer? What if I don’t do internet banking?

To do this I may conceivably go to a friend’s house to use their printer; locate a shop with a photocopier; go to my bank to discover these two amounts; and locate a friendly office worker whose fax machine I can use. This is an internet business.

All this. Just to access my own cash.

I’m not sure at the moment whether I think this is more stupid than NatWest’s determination that every single customer of theirs have their own portable car reader in order to move their own money around or not.

Technology is supposed to make our lives easier, not ten times harder.