Anian

I moved to a different town and went into HSBC to transfer my "homebank" to the one in the new town. No need they said, you can do everything from every branch. A few months later I get a letter telling me to pick up my new credit card from the bank. So I go to my local branch to pick it up. Guess which branch they sent it to. So they send it to my new branch. I go to pick it up again. Too late - it was there for over a week so they sent it back.

Never got a credit card from them again. I didn't close down my account, they just never got themselves organised enough to enable me to get the card!

Sally Redux

So my son (19) feels very hard done by because we haven't given him a car and we are apparently the only parents not to have done so. At first I felt angry, as we pay his college tuition, room, food and course materials 100% and give him an allowance on top, however now I'm wondering if this really is the norm in the US and we should do this?

SultanOfSwing

It won't be in our house. I haven't even got room up my arse to cover the stupid, backwardly prohibitive cost of 'higher' education in this bloody place, never mind a ****ing car on to of that.

Give him a clip round the ear and remind him he's British ...

Jerseygirl

Re college tuition/room/food etc my husband took the view that we brought our daughter here so we should pick up the tab.

Almost all the kids I know here get a new car for their 16th or 17th birthday.

N1cky

It's the norm where you live. You just need to drive by the high schools and see all the cars that are nicer than your own parked there.

Everything here seems to be bought on the never never, as if having credit isn't like spending real money.

Sally Redux

I'll have to get a job now

SultanOfSwing

Let him get the job, he's the one that wants the car

Sally Redux

Yeah that was what I thought...I'm all muddled though living in this strange world.

scrubbedexpat097

Tell him to get a job and save up for one himself. It's possible to work as well as go to college. Or compromise and tell him you will help with the cost if he shows willing to earn some of the money as well. He will either agree or stop whinning

SultanOfSwing

Meh, just cause everyone else's parents want to be in debt forever doesn't man you have to

Sally Redux

That's just it - if he showed willing to put something in I wouldn't mind.

Surely it can't be healthy to have this generation who get everything on a plate

SultanOfSwing

No, it's not. I'm only half a generation removed and none of us were this self-entitled at that age. I mean, I paid for my own fags and beer and everything ...

scrubbedexpat097

Stick to your guns Sal

If he wants one badly enough then he will realise the only way to get your help is to show willing himself

Sally Redux

Bloody kids today.

I really believe we were a whole lot happier with a whole lot less.

N1cky

Even if you did buy him a car, have you asked him how he is going to afford to run it? I might stump up for the car, I wouldn't be putting any gas in it...