Wednesday 17 February 2016

Random act of kindness: The bank of cakes

I'm with Natwest and I prefer doing bank transfers face to face then doing it online. I tried online banking once and it’s actually quicker for me to pop to the Natwest which is less than a 5 minutes walk from my flat. If the contact I’m transferring to is on the mobile app then I can transfer the money fine, but anyone else I’d rather get a human to do it for me.

A few  weeks I go I went to the bank and saw it was being refurbished. I waited 15 minutes in line before being told I was in the wrong queue and then had to queue another 5 minutes before the manager said she could transfer the money in her office. I asked why there couldn't make signage while the refurbishment was going on, but they said it was early days and they were still figuring things out.

Once I got home I felt kind of bad as I thought I was a little short with the manager, and realised that during the refurbishment quite a lot of customers may get frustrated with the building works and take it out on the staff. When working at a local venue I know that the customer can sometimes ‘shoot the messenger’ when more often than not the systems the staff have to work with can’t be changed.

I thought about what I could do to give the staff a bit of a boost and I could only think of one thing….cakes! Cakes and biscuits make everything better. So I made a batch of chocolate brownies (with a 5 minute microwave recipe which Charlotte doesn't think counts as baking,) and took them into the local branch a couple of weeks ago. The manager was very surprised, but appreciated the gesture.

I gave a little card and said that until the refurbishment was complete in March, I’d make some cake or biscuits once a week. A few days later I got a lovely email from the manager.


So far I've made non cook biscuits, banana slices, a sponge cake with sprinkles in the mix (a birthday present from Jen and Mark) and as a result I've had one of the builders at Natwest ask if I was married, because if I wasn't two of his guys wanted to marry me!


Each time I go into the bank I meet different members of staff, and I always like seeing their reaction. I’m known as the cake lady.

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