RANDOM RANT- Card charges

*Written a while back it’s not great, but gave me the chance to get this issue off my chest*

-Card charges are a idea straight from the devil-

You’re in the middle of a car journey. You need a break. That service station looks good. Not a five star shining light of sheer class, but it’ll do.

Hmm, no money left. Ah well, this is a service station! There will be many places to bleed your account dry. And so there is. Dododo, card in, screen loads...amount? £20 please, thank you very much. What’s that? A £1.85 charge? That’s fine…wait, what!?!

I really do hate that. If life wasn’t occasionally grey and tedious enough, here comes card machine charges. Some lifeless berk thought those up, and when the idea crossed his mind I bet he burped out a bellowing toad like laugh.

There’s no need for it. I’ll bet many people in service stations are already miserable when they enter. Most of the time you’re either driving back from that wonderful holiday you wished had never ended, and stepping into some dark overpriced hall of bland fast food chains and Whsmiths is hardly likely to replicate the experience. So when you see that you’re being charged for a service that by all rights should be free, it’s likely that all the good work done by your holiday is undone. No, life isn’t relaxing, with the sun always winking back at you. It’s a depressing world where some snivelling berk gets off on charging you for simply taking your money out. Welcome to reality.

It’s our money! I shouldn’t be charged for wanting to get at it! The money charging machines are, pure and simple, extremely exploitative. But from a completely cynical and evil view, they’re brilliant. They attack us when we are at are most vulnerable. What I fear is that the same idea will be applied to many parts of our life (if they aren’t already).

Picture it. You’re on a plane. You and everyone else are plugged into individual air supplies. No joint oxygen sharing here. Halfway through the flight you notice a strange flashing red light on your arm rest. Oxygen near depleted. Switching to alternative air supply. You worriedly tap a stewardess on the shoulder, and ask what this is all about.

“Oh it’s nothing, not really” she says, with a somewhat demented giggle. “It’s just our airlines policy. Unless you pay the extra charge then your air will be swapped with the alternative, Oxygen lite. It makes it incredibly difficult to breathe, with a bare minimum oxygen content, but you will survive. But only just,” and she giggles again, this time at your awestruck expression. “It’s only £4.99 for Oxygen regular, and £9.99 for Oxygen supreme.”

At first you consider rejecting this out of an emphasised sense of injustice. But then your throat feels sore. Your hands go numb. You can feel you lungs squeezing themselves dry to survive on the small slurp of oxygen you have left. Your vision becomes blurry. You turn again to the stewardess and give her a strained nod.

“So do you want to pay through cash or card?” Card you gesture, pushing it into the machine. Is there anyway for this could be worse, as you enter your pin. Turns out there is. A £1.80 card charge.

You may laugh, but it’ll happen. Squeezing money out of you is what some do for a job, and I couldn’t possibly imagine how miserable those peoples lives are.

(PS-The spelling of ‘lite’ is deliberate, not a spelling error. Just wanted to make that clear. Thanks for reading).