Secure storage of documents

"anon" wrote

Hardly! - Losing some papers and food poisoning are *not* the "same".

"anon" wrote

It's not always the size of the *risk* that matters, but the size of the potential *outcome*.

For instance, would you be willing to double any Jackpot I won on the National Lottery, if I gave you 25 beforehand? The odds that you'd need to pay out are very very small - but if, by some chance, my numbers came up; how would you manage to pay me?!

I probably would take the chance, but I would sweat over it until it was past. The odds of winning are so low though that it would be worth it. Especially if I could convince several million other people to do the same!

Heres another one- would you sell your lottery ticket after 7.30pm on the night of the draw for 2? You would have doubled your money almost immediately- got to be worth it surely?

Neb

In message , anon writes

The main point is that the Bank does set out to provide a 'safe custody' business. As a "Balliee for Reward", this would place a far higher security requirement on the bank than their safes are able to offer, which were designed to hold cash and documents of value to a reasonable degree of safety. This degree of safety was usually against fire and theft, but not a determined thief.

Originally, Banks would accept items for safe custody within their safe as a 'gratuitous ballee' which carried no real degree of responsibility on the bank, but because customers tended to regard this concession as a 'right' and loads of them demanded that banks hold all their valuables for free, Banks introduced a fee as a deterrent.

You have been typical of the publics belief, i.e. that banks have super secure safes in which anybody can hire a space. This is not the case. Banks generally 'self insure' and the last thing they want is something of value to somebody else. Therefore they will generally only accept sealed parcels 'contents unknown to the bank' and will decline ALL responsibility.

Try a safe custody company.

That isn't how insurance works, though, is it? Insurance companies have a lot of clients paying a small amount to insure a small risk of a big loss, so the risk averages out.

If I could persuade enough people to to give me 25, (say 2 million people), then I would certainly go for it, and retire on the guaranteed profit (50 million income, about 20 million costs if I am really unlucky). Hell, if

*every* lottery player wanted in on the scheme I would drop my price to a pound and give 5% of my profits to good causes. It must work, Camelot do it.

Dom

Stunning fractal photographs

This is probably the core of our difference of opinion.

Firstly I am talking about the bank agreeing to a certain amount of liability if anything happens to the items they are looking after. They don't need to take out an insurance policy, because the itemsare distributed around hundreds of branches all over the country. They can just estimate how much they will have to pay out in an average year (over *all* of their branches) and add that to the operating costs for the scheme.

If I post a valuable item, I can pay a pound or so to cover it against loss, theft or damage en route. I regard posting something as relatively risky (compared to leaving it sitting in a fire safe in a bank for a year), so how can you argue that it would cost the bank more than 25 to cover it? The cost ought to be less than a pound.

I agree that if they did charge a very large amount on the grounds that they are probably going to lose it and have to pay compensation, I wouldn't touch it.

I often park in the street. I don't expect or require a public car park to be any more secure than the street. The car park owner isn't looking after my car, so why should I expect him to be liable for damage? He is just providing me with a convenient space to park, which might only be patrolled once in a while. How could I expect the owner to prevent, say, some idiot pranging my car as they park up?

Dom

Stunning fractal photographs

In message , anon writes

No, they banks, generally, dont set out to provide a Safe Deposit Service. They just have safes which people like to use.

No. I don't think you have thought this through and I dont think you have sufficient knowledge about the quality of bank safes and banks' ability to provide the quality of service that would be required if formal safe custody services were to be offered on a mass market basis without the depositors having to provide their own insurance.

As an aside....

Once, a a client of a well know high street bank sent them a letter in which it asked the bank to allow to gentlemen, upon presentation of ID, to open and inspect the contents of two sealed packages which the bank was holding under the description 'sealed package, contents unknown to the bank'. BY mistake, the packages were opened whilst bank staff were still in the room. They observed two immensely valuable paintings in the packages. The gentlemen turned out to be valuers from a very well know London Auction house. The Bank refused to accept the items back. NO amount of spread insurance could cover for such things.

Back to the point...

If the bank has no knowledge of what is being deposited how can it take an open ended risk?

>

"anon" wrote

There wouldn't necessarily be any "guaranteed profit"!

"anon" wrote

OK so far ...

"anon" wrote

Oh, that is where you're wrong - if you are **really** unlucky, each of the 2 million people will buy 200+ lines on the lottery - across several weeks - and the Jackpot payouts will easily exceed 50 million!

[400+ million lines = roughly (on average) 28+ jackpot winners of (on average) 2million each...]

"john boyle" wrote

Like cash? ;-)

"anon" wrote

How long does it take to post the item? A couple of days?

Then you are right, the bank insurance *should* cost less than a quid **for each couple of days** (assuming the postal cost of equivalent insurance is a quid).

So, using your own assumptions, the cost of insurance on the bank storage should be less than around 180 per year.

Even at a quarter of this rate, it would still cost well over 25!

In message , Tim writes

Cash isn't the problem. It value is finite. Its the paintings etc., thats the problem.