Its official I have joined the local “NBK SUX” club. I have never seen a bank like NBK before.
There a plenty of local blogs sharing stories of Canceled Credit Cards without prior notification/justification. (I’ve had one of my cards canceled like that too)

Then there’s the double deduction from your salary account. Lets say your monthly settlement is KD 300, they often deduct KD 600. Even if you transfer your money to another savings account, its transferred back to the salary account, and it gets promptly deducted again.

Its not my fault as a consumer that NBK are getting slapped with Fines and Penalties from CBK because of “unregulated” banking practices *laughs*. But NBK are certainly exalting that toll unto their middle class customers.

Since my salary is no longer being transferred to my NBK account, except for KD 150 monthly, NBK has just called me and threatened legal action, if I did not pay KD 300 end of this month. I could not help but smile. For the following reasons:

1. The total amount due on my master card is KD 750
2. Im making monthly payments of KD 150, that means within 5 months they will recover the full amount.
3. The amount of damage their dirty tactics are causing is worth more than the amount their trying to recover. People will and have already switched banks. But NBK doesn’t care, because they depend on their key accounts, and those accounts can keep them afloat without us peons. They know this, and exploit it. Why should they care for it?
4. NBK certainly left a bad after taste
5. I will certainly recommend other banks to people, since Id rather take my business to a bank that will make newbie procedural mistakes, rather than practice tyrant banking methodologies, by threatening legal action at every chance they get.

Bottom line… NBK certainly isnt the bank it used to be.

Here are some other local bloggers that agree with me.

Jacqui was issued a credit card without a salary.

Zdistric’s blog is being actively blocked by NBK (hmm wonder why…) maybe cause he picked on NBK’s online system here, and there was another issue he posted here.

Another blogger has withdrawn their post about NBK (probably due to legal action) but it was a funny post about plagerism. (It was posted 4 hours ago) I had a good laugh at it though. I wont mention the blogger but if you do look it up, im sure youll find a cached version of it somewhere. Especially local blog aggregators.

G’s Blog, has a similar story to mine, its funny =) I like it.

If you search for NBK sucks in google.. your bound to get more results.

But NBK seems to be evil villain among bloggers, common NBK dont plagurize blogs, thats bound to backfire. And it dit, oh but I forgot you have lawyers to deal with those bloggers. But its ok for you to steal other peoples work, cause you know your too powerfull an entity to be sued in Kuwait.

This post is response to Erzulies Post.
Im an ASK’er as well, and during my time, I came to the conclusion during my sophomore year, that the teachers had their license suspended in Canada/US. Hence employed at ASK.
We had some real nut jobs, and I still hate them to this very day. I hope to God I never see them, if I do, spitting in their face is the best they could possibly hope for.

I personally believe all Private Schools are failures, run as a profit generating venture, and not an educational program. The owners dont give a damn about education, never have never will.

However I would still enroll my kids there, because government schools is not an option that Im willing to consider. Thats just … well… I wont rant about it.

The state of Kuwait doesnt care about education. As it is not beneficial to them. Look around you and you will see why.

Education has the power to threaten everything, government, policies, way of life. For centuries people have feared education. This is specially true in Kuwait. Admit it, at least for yourself.

Dont give me this crap about western culture, and how it “defiles” us arabs. Kuwait is at an all time low, look at the streets, the dudes at the malls, with weird haircuts, harassing women 24/7. And lately girls are doing the same thing.

Its not uncommon that I overhear teenage girls talking to their friends “Yellah khan giz al 7ob”

I was like wtf?

Kuwait needs to live and let live. Go back to the way things were in the 60’s. We were conservative then, but not culturally sick. Today is all about double standards.

How many Kuwaities from “good homes” have their own liquor cabinet? Eh? I see some of you smiling already.

How many Kuwaitis travel to” Thailand, Bahrain, UAE Each and Every Weekend? Hmmm? Specifically those aged 18-25 Bachelors. Yeah …. I can certainly see how private schools are responsible for that. *Sarcasm*

Its like Cronus said: “Also, before we point fingers at the west let’s first pick up a mirror and take a hard look at ourselves.”

Oh don’t worry folks, Im sure all your sons are going to Thailand/Bahrain/UAE to check out their cultural museum, or the aquarium in Bangkok.

Im not saying all of em, but damn theres a large majority. You just have to open your eyes.

Now back to MOE, what good have they done for this country hmmm?

They should regulate and subsidize educational fees, both private and government. Why do I pay more in Kuwait for a University Education that I would pay at MIT as an International Student? Oh yeah, I forgot, its because schools in Kuwait are obviously better than MIT. *nods, slaps forhead*. Im such an idiot.

Why did MOE recently make a decision that all universities in Bahrain are no longer recognized hmmmm? (MOE pulls this lame stunt all the time, the list of accredited/recognized Universities keep changing so fast, by the time you get accepted to an accredited institution it may have already been taken of the list on a whim)

Was it because the local universities are loosing business? Coincidence? I dont think so.

So from the the educational mafias perspective its like this:

Hmmmm all my potentials profit is traveling to Bahrain on the weekend to get their degree. Were loosing money here, and the banks are loosing potential loans to pay for our insanely expensive tuition for a crappy education.

*Light Bulb*

Oh yeah we can pay off MOC to no longer recognize degrees from Bahrain…. problem solved.

In this aspect, Kuwait has always chosen to ride our backs. You wanna get educated hmm? Take out a loan, lol… and then well see.

I drowned blissfully in the violent oceans of Information Technology way back in 1992. The topic that got me hooked? Hacking and IT Security, I was compiling evil code, and I admit to testing it when I was but 13 years old. I’ve seen computing equipment that a lot of you have never seen. Ever since then my passion for IT has consumed me, every free minute was spent on IT related activities. Be it reading, trying out stuff, coding, in short I just lived and breathed IT for a very long time.

I was determined to work in the Private Sector as soon as I could, and luckily I landed a good job at my first attempt. The people I worked with were nothing short of exotically wonderful talented driven “Kuwaiti” IT pros. (And I admit, I lucked out on that one too.) No fabled Newspapers and Tea there… No sire, it was pure hardcore IT freaks, working away in some dark shunned corner in the most infamous hidden away room of some nameless ruthless corporation.

When I look back today at how I got started, and remember all those people that helped me get to where I am today, It brings tears to my heart. And often I wish to go back to that time, and perhaps do even better than before. But another important realization I made, is that IT has changed. My personal and professional attitude towards it has changed a lot too. I went through the phases of “I am the almighty powerful “ROOT”, and all you dumb ass users can go to hell” to the “Im sorry sir, whats your user name again? AHa … so its hgber eh? Um yeah” rm -rf /home/hgber/* “*cough* Um yeah sir, it seems the backup system failed yesterday and somehow your home directory has been deleted”

User: “Nooooooooooo…….”

Sysadmins.. you know what im talking about, and we’ve all been there…. or were tempted to be evil, common admit it at one point in time, maybe even till this very day you thought to yourself, Im a Domain Admin/Root user…. The admin-complex…. we all had the bug

In recent years It dawned upon me what IT really was, it was not a matter of personal preference. It was not a matter of what flavor of Linux/Unix you liked. And which you thought sucked. Or if your a Paladin of Microsoft or the Dark Knight of Open Source. It was not about how “you” would do it. It was not about you hating the sales manager, or the marketing manager cause he has no idea about what s/he is talking about.

No not at all. Information Technology is all about end user education, its about “helping” the corporate business get from point A to point B, smoothly, and efficiently, and last but not least cost effectively. How does IT do this you ask? They do this by effectively using the latest technology to enhance your business process.

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