Modern Electronics (was Re: List charter mods & headcount... ; -))

From: der Mouse <mouse_at_Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA>
Date: Sun Jun 20 02:08:09 2004

> Tools are great, I use them myself. But you have to have some
> knowledge of what's going on to know when the answer the tool gives
> you is wrong (maybe you didn't feed the tool enough information,
> forgot something, or there is a bug in the program, etc).

This is *so* true.

When I and my now-ex first arranged our mortgage, at one point we asked
the loan officer how much we'd pay in interest over the entire
amortization period, given certain parameters. We knew the number
would be somewhere between two and three times the principal amount.
The fellow punched at his calculator and came up with a number that was
_way_ too low - later, our own calculations led us to suspect he gave
us the total over just the term, not the full amortization period.
When we pointed out that it was unreasonably low, he steadfastly stood
by the number his calculator had churned out, not even realizing that
it couldn't be anywhere near the answer to the question we wanted
answered.

I've always thought that was an excellent example of using a tool with
grossly insufficient understanding. He not only didn't sanity-check
the number himself, he didn't even acknowledge how unreasonable it was
upon being called on it!

I also was unable to ever get the bank to tell me exactly how interest
was calculated - I had to juggle possibilities myself until I came up
with one that tracked the bank's numbers exactly. (Today, I likely
would not sign until they coughed up such information, and most
certainly would be more insistent about it.)

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Received on Sun Jun 20 2004 - 02:08:09 BST