Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

I talked to someone at Amalgamated Bank this morning, who told me what I would need to do to take my mother's name off a joint account, then suggested that I set up online banking and then transfer the money to my account at another bank. Setting up online banking on their website was straightforward, and then it popped up a verification step involving sending a text to a cell phone associated with the account. Entirely reasonable, but my phone number isn't on the account.

I called back, and talked to another helpful person. She told me how to add the number: send her an email with "attn: Cheryl" as the subject line, giving them my current phone number and attaching a copy of my ID. I did that, and got an "undeliverable" message from Postmaster@[bank], saying I wasn't authorized to relay messages through the server. So I called back, again, and spoke to someone who told me that oh, yes, it does that, but it does deliver the messages. I got her to check, and they had received my email, but Why?

This still feels like significantly less hassle than sending them a copy of my ID, and an original death certificate. That has to be done by paper mail, not email, because they want an "original" death certificate, which she promised they'd return. (At the moment, those originals are in either New Orleans or London, I'm in Boston, and my brother is on vacation in Ireland.)

I am getting thoroughly tired of PayPal telling me I have to change my password. Or, rather, forcing me to go through a password-retrieval-and-change rigamarole without telling me what it's doing.

This is the third time in less than two months.

I am going to try calling and talking to a human being later. elisem, I'm sending you a check for those earrings.