The Soapbox: the ninety-minute lunch uproar

0:00Discussion keeps the world turning. This is Round Table. You're tuned in to Round Table. I'm Steve Hatherley today with Yushan and Fei-Fei. Coming up, what if the most controversial thing a bank could do wasn't charging new fees or closing branches completely but simply taking an hour and a half for lunch? That's exactly what happened in Hubei and the backlash was immediate. Office workers were panicking, elderly customers were worried, but underneath all that noise, a bigger question seems to be hiding. Why are we so attached to ways of doing things that don't even serve us anymore? Don't forget you can find us at Round Table China on Apple Podcasts, and also don't forget that you can send us an email to AuraVoicenote to RoundTablePodcast at qq.com once again, RoundTablePodcast at qq.com.

1:20Time once again for the soapbox. It is our segment where we find something that's been circulating online, perhaps a little bit of a controversy. We bring it in here, we talk about it, and then we share our feelings to Fei-Fei, you've got it today. Yes, be no wild for me to do soapbox. I mean, after you reach to a certain age, you don't feel passionate about certain things. But this is not for his side. I feel like that could be your soapbox. But this one really sort of triggered me on some level, which happened in Hu Bei province in a place called Ansh, that in August, one of the anxious branch of China Construction Bank, they decided all of its outlets would try to emit day closure, meaning they were still open at 9 a.m. in the morning. But they were suspend all in-person, teller and counter services at from 12.30 in the afternoon to 2 p.m. So they will resume to their regular hours after 2 p.m. until 5 p.m.

2:24And also, at the same time, you can still use their self-serving machines, mobile banking, online banking, that's operating 24.7. It's just the in-person teller and counter services will be suspended. So this is different from, okay, let's talk about banks in general in China. Normally, this is an exception, right? Normally, they are open from 9 to 5. Non-stop. Non-stop, seven days a week. Six, probably 60s days a week. They will close like one day during the week. Maybe. But usually for most banks on weekends, there's someone on shift that we can count on. Yeah, but they will sometimes open for a few hours, but could be shorter, right? Don't work days. The issue here is that one and a half hour lunchtime closing all teller booths, that is the thing that has people all fired up. Yeah, because this anxious bank branch's decision was actually the first time a major commercial

3:28bank branch designed to try this. We've only seen similar lunch break trials in smaller banks, like rural area or in village banks. So it's never been these such a big branch deciding to make such a big move. So that's why a lot of office workers, for instance, they will worry what if I need to go because the lunch break is basically my only time frame available during the day to run errands in the banks? What would happen afterwards if I can want to go to the banks during the day? Do I need to go to my boss ask for some leaves? Yeah, otherwise you'd have to step away from your office when you're supposed to be at the office. Yeah. And also the elderly popular time to go to the bank is at lunchtime. So that would affect that group of people too. Well, usually elders still help head out there early in the morning as early as the bank opens.

4:31Yeah, yeah, my bank opens at nine and let me tell you something. If you want to be the first customer, don't arrive at like 8.55. Because my grandma's and grandpa's in my community, they've been there for a while already. Lining up and front of the office. Oh, yeah, before that gate opens. I feel like they were there overnight. Oh, the concert tickets. But I think that's also a mindset of, you know, in China at least in China, that banks will remain open throughout the day. So I can step into any branches any time to do my errands. I feel like, and maybe you'll talk about this when we get to your soapbox, but I feel like people look at a bank differently than they do somewhere else, another business. If a coffee shop closed for lunch from, you know, 1230 to 2, nobody's going to care. But I feel like people have this attitude about banks is you are there to serve me.

5:33And when I want to do my banking between a reasonable hour, reasonable hours of the day, then you better be there. I think it's because the bank, at least for the past decades, it's been an important connection that people have in terms of money or financial management, money to remanagement. So previously before the digital banks and the idea of online banking become so popular and common as it is nowadays, going to the bank is the only way to sort your financial issues out, where your management issues out, or get money, or save money. But nowadays, I think it makes sense to me that people are using more online banking and just via phone apps and stuff. So that the actual brick and mortar banks' operation can more or less be lowered a little bit, so that they can have a little bit of a lunch break. I'm sorry. And I guess that's why this is such a big debate, right? Because you said it, you shan.

6:34Most of our banking is done online now anyway, I suppose. So why do we even really need to go to the bank anyway? Yeah, I guess most of the people don't even need to go to banks, because even within the branches themselves, they also have a lot of self-service machines that you can basically do everything there. Well, yesterday, just in the afternoon, I was in a bank myself. I was there to get some foreign currency in preparation for a future trip. Humble break. Well, it's going to drop that in there and move it. But I was sitting there and waiting because there were four people ahead of me and I was observing them. One was an expat and Becky Stenny's students who's getting his account registered, which has to be done offline. Another one is an old lady trying to get money from her old-style booklets. You know, the account that doesn't... Well, it still exists online, but old people don't trust online stuff.

7:36Or don't know how to use the app. Yeah, don't know how to use. So they still bring that little booklet with them in terms of whenever they want to retreat money. And then there are two ladies just doing a bank card stuff that they have to get the card offline and give it to the person standing on the other side of the counter. And then there's a lady retrieving a larger sum of money. So these are the actual cases that I saw in person yesterday. And you, the international globe traveler. Yeah, of course. And then in the meantime, I see about the similar amount of people just not yet reaching to the counter area, just already get their business done in those self-serving machines. Yeah, I think I see your point. Because the people who know how to use the apps or don't need the tellers, don't go to use the tellers. Exactly. Nobody makes a day trip to the bank for fun. Yeah. They do it because they have to do it. And the people who are there to use the tellers are there because they need to use a teller. They can't do it through their phone or otherwise.

8:39All right, Feife, you're feeling a certain type of way about this. Are you ready for your soapbox? Yes. Okay, can I just say I've lived like a teller before. I used to work on rotating shifts in a road newsroom that run 24-7. And I know exactly what a lunch break means in that world. You got about 20 minutes to finish a lunchbox that's been somewhat mushed together after sitting on your desk for a couple of hours. And you are not really sure what you were swallowing because at the same time you were working in front of your screens. So when people act like this bank thing is something outrageous. I get the instinct, but I don't buy it because here is the thing. A newsroom always has something happening. But how busy can a bank counter be at 1 p.m. into this world where your phone can already basically do everything a teller does?

9:42So when, think about it, when was the last time you and me stepping into one of these banks? For me at least I haven't stepped into any banks this year physically. So when we're asking people to eat that tasteless, mushy lunchbox in a rush exactly for what? So I think this time people's concerns are not really about inconvenience. It's about this is how it's always been. Gats treat it like an actual argument. So nobody defending the old system, run the numbers for how people bank today. They're defending it because it's a familiar and familiar feels safe even when it stopped making sense today. So we do this constantly actually cleaning to a routine now because it works. But because changing it feels admitting the old way was wrong and that reflex multiplied across entire industry is how you end up with people white-knockling through lunch to guard an empty counter.

10:43So I think the real story here is not the banking hours, but our allergy to admitting something is outdated. Hmm, so you're completely fine with this lunch hour? Yeah, I don't want to see that teller sitting there, hey more herself, doing nothing. Well, Kant really just want to have hours to enjoy at least slowly eat his or her lunch. Because let me tell you, swallowing a whole lunchbox within 20 minutes is not healthy and not fun at all when I was working in a newsroom. I've never seen a teller eating. Because they're working in rotation. Exactly. So if they're working, here's my counter argument to yours. If they're working in rotation, then I have to assume that the teller sitting at the desk has not been sitting at the desk since 9 a.m.

11:43and will not continue to be sitting at the same desk until 5 p.m. I assume that that person is sitting there during a lunch hour because they are given their lunch hour at a different time of the day, 1 p.m. 11 a.m. I don't know how bank schedules work, but they're not there chained to their desk. If you're not removing a lunch break, you're just on a rotating schedule so you don't take it at the same time as everybody else. What's the problem with that? So I think, Steve, when you're working on a shift, especially a rotation shift, even though you are granted like 10 to 20 or even 30 minutes of lunch breaks, you will still feel that pressure. If you drag your lunch time a little bit longer, that means somebody sitting on that desk waiting for a customer will be sort of lagged behind his or her lunch hour. You need to rush through your lunch not because of the workload, but also because

12:45your consideration to your co-workers. Yeah, you can't really enjoy your lunch because you know somebody is sitting there waiting for you. Yeah, and also we're talking about banks, for instance, for certain branches in really busy business districts. The lunch hour is probably their business time having the biggest number of clients. So maybe the whole team, even though you are working in rotation shifts, you can't be saying things like, you know, it's my lunch hour. So even though we have 15 people waiting in the line, it's not my business. You still need to go there. Same if not similar to other service providing lines of works too. Like for example, for nurses, being in a shift of work is different from being in a shift of work while having a lunch break. So the expectations for them can be different, depending on that. And honestly speaking, my mom, Essinner, who's been working in this line of

13:46work for three decades, I would think that she would prefer to have a break than not. Honestly, speaking, how do you feel about this bank thing? I think it's easily sorted out on our ends. If we have to plan a bank visit, then if they have to have a break in the middle of the day, we just schedule some other time. It's not that big of a deal for us to just tolerate a little bit more or give more understanding to the people who the equalities are of some lunch break. But what about the, well, okay, yeah, I understand. I was going to say, what about the people that you saw there at the bank who needed to be there? Yeah, they can be there. Yeah, they can be there at other times. Sure. But what about office workers? You're right. We talked about the elderly, and I think, yeah, sure, if they don't have a schedule during the day, they can pick a day or, you know, pick a time during a day. But what about office workers? Because for me, this is a pretty legit complaint. You don't have a lot of, you have a lit, if you do have a lunch break where you

14:46can step away from your desk, you do have a limited period of time where you can go and get errands done if you have to on that day. So if you can't do that during your lunch break, then that's going to require you to inconvenience your co-workers or your boss and say, hey, I gotta go to the bank and do this. Or wait until the weekend, maybe. That would be your next opportunity to do so. So can we not make a compromise here? What if they just left one teller window open instead of all of them? Well, so I think it's up to the bank's decision. When we're talking about this lunch closure thing is only one branch of one bank in a smaller city in China. Who is this all over? Oh, this bank branch is now the most famous bank branch in this country. But when we're talking about, for example, the business bank, bank branches in Shen General Shanghai in Beijing, I don't see them considering closing off during the lunch hours

15:50because that's their heaviest foot traffic during the day. So I think it's up to the bank's deciding and also I think cost can be another factor for them to deciding that which branches can offer a kind of fort this lunch closure during the day, which brands cannot be operating in these systems. It's not like what the whole country is closing. The whole country's banks will be closing down during lunch hours. It's just a feel because of the differences online tools, digital tools are providing us. Yeah, and supply and demand is the easiest argument, right? If there are, if you have a heavy number of customers or a large number of customers during lunch hour, well, you're probably not going to close during lunch hour. But if you see like one or two people a couple of times a week at lunch time, then it just wouldn't make sense to have somebody there. Yeah. So just let the tellers enjoy their one and a half hour lunch break

16:54doing whatever they want, taking the stress off. Yeah. And I agree with you. I was playing devil's advocate before. And I would have supported my argument before. If China's bank schedules were not as amazing as they are, I had my mind blown. It happened maybe within the first few months of me living here. I lived in Korea before this. I lived in Canada before that. In Korea, in Canada, you have a hard time finding a bank open on a Saturday, very limited number of branches, if at all. And Sunday, well, that's unheard of unless something changed and I'm unaware of that. So I have always lived with the idea of you have to do your banking, you have to. You don't have

17:54a choice between Monday and Friday, 9am and 3pm or 4pm. 3pm. Yeah. That's so early. Yeah. I know. Do they close during? Why do I have to be finished work at 3pm? What are you doing? Maybe something administrative afterwards. So they can get out. Yeah. I get five to get out. I'm sure. So anyway, here I am walking down the street in my new China neighborhood. And it was a Saturday. I remember it was the Saturday. I walked by the bank and I look inside and I saw people in there. And I thought, is the bank being robbed? There are why are there people in there? And it was open. It was like, oh, that's really cool. Then a few months after that, it was a Sunday afternoon. I was walking by the bank and there were people in there again. And I was like, no way. The banks open on Sundays. And I like hit my wife on the shoulder. I was like, look, look, look at that. The banks open. The biggest. And my wife's a Korean. So she's like, whoa, the bank's open. We had never seen anything like that before. So that's a long way of saying,

18:56if you're going to provide an amazing service to customers six or seven days a week, go ahead and take your hour and a half lunchtime because you deserve it. I didn't expect your biggest culture shock come from the banking system in China. It's one. It's definitely one of the things that stood out. Yeah. Yeah. Where I'm from. So before if you want to go to the bank, you need to call in for a leave from your work during week date. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Or otherwise, you can't do it on the weekend. There you go. That'll do it for today's round table. Thank you very much for sharing your time with us today for Yushan and Fei Fei. I am Steve Hatherley. And we ask you to join us again next time. Bye. Bye.