Tuesday, September 22, 2026

Look, Chase, I want my credit card statement to come by mail

Chase really wants me to "go paperless." I don't want to. I have repeatedly declined the bank's invitation to increase its already obscene profits just that much more by allowing Chase to avoid mailing me credit card statements.

But Chase is no longer taking "no" for an answer.

I had a bill due yesterday. I paid it on line, as I usually do. Chase asked me to go paperless, as it usually does. I declined, as I always do. Or I thought I did. Take a look:
(This image, and the ones that follow, have been edited to remove any trace of my actual account number. Click on any image to enlarge or clarify.)

My thought process was this: I don't want paperless statements; therefore, by not checking the items, I should escape paperless status one more time.

Chase thought differently. This is from the email it sent me announcing my 'successful enrollment' in paperless communications:
That did not get me upset. Perhaps the webpage is ambiguously worded. Possibly I misunderstood. Besides, there should be a simple solution: Go back on the Chase website and click that which had been previously unclicked... and this I promptly did:
Problem solved, right?

Wrong!

Chase promptly sent me another email telling me I had somehow again 'successfully enrolled' in paperless communications.

Heads they win, tails I lose.

Now I am upset. Since these are the only two options, one of them should result in Chase mailing me statements on paper as I want.

But Chase thinks differently.

Chase's interpretation of its own webpage reminds me of this exchange from the 2007 animated feature Shrek the Third where Prince Charming tries to pin down Pinocchio as to Shrek's whereabouts:
Prince Charming: You! You can't lie! So tell me puppet... where... is... Shrek?
Pinocchio: Uh. Hmm, well, uh, I don't know where he's not.
Prince Charming: You're telling me you don't know where Shrek is?
Pinocchio: It wouldn't be inaccurate to assume that I couldn't exactly not say that it is or isn't almost partially incorrect.
Prince Charming: So you do know where he is!
Pinocchio: On the contrary. I'm possibly more or less not definitely rejecting the idea that in no way with any amount of uncertainty that I undeniably...
Prince Charming: Stop it!
Pinocchio: ... do or do not know where he shouldn't probably be, if that indeed wasn't where he isn't. Even if he wasn't at where I knew he was...
[Pigs and Gingerbread Man begin singing]
Pinocchio: That'd mean I'd really have to know where he wasn't.
It's all quite amusing in the movie. But it's aggravating as all get-out when Chase tries this in real life. I want my statements by mail, Chase. Please.

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