BANK CLERKS IN VICTORIA.

Otago Witness, Issue 1156, 24 January 1874, Page 2

BANK CLERKS IN VICTORIA.

The Melbourne Daily Telegraph remarks : — "The Union Bank defalcations have drawn attention once more to the payment of bank clerks and their position in the social world. As regards the rates ostensibly paid to bank employe)), they were officially returned last year to the Government as follows :—: —

We do not knww that hostile criticism ■vrould hold water if this list were adhered to. In that case it could scarcely be said with truth that bank clerks were ill-paid, or that their remuneration compared untavourably with the rates of other mercantile establishments. Nor does the list show any unfair division of remuneration. A gowd deal of stress is usually laid r.pen the amount of money that goes through a teller's hand, but the trust is more seeming than real. The teller does, or should, account each day for the j money he received at the beginning. His work is that of handling counters, and though smartness is required to prevent vexatious errors, yet thtre is little real responsibility in the work compared with that of managers, win may never handle a coin, but who cotld make collusive bargains, and pick the pockets of the shareholders a thousand | different ways. Even where the robbery corsists in the actual abstraction of funds, baiks seldom suffer by their tellers, the meshanical check on their simple duties being so easy and complete. Tellers who haidie immense sums daily would not, we apprehend, be ill paid, or disproportionately paid, were the official rates adhe'ed to ; but the desire to cut down expenses is probably making that liss more nominal than real. There is a constant temptation to bank managers to employ juniors, who are, indeed, absolutely thrust upon them by a dtsire to get the foot upon the bottom rings of the ladder. Lads of sixteen aTß°seen gravely perched on high in olurge of ledgers. A customer has the consolation of reEeoting that a boy fresh frtm school, who perhaps haa never ldxned to hold hia tongue, knows all fcJM»e and ©\it» of »n important atocouut.

Todd was a junior in the Union Bank, doing the work of a £4w teller for £175, and one remembers tha,t the official in charge of the Egerton bank when it was robbed was a mere lad. In both instances young men were thrust forward into positions they should have only occupied after many years of service, because, one suspects, heavy salaries were thereby dispensed with. Juniors should certainly be kept in their places. But as to the Todd case, it is a very awkward one from which to deduce a moral against bank management. The direct lesson it teaches is to young men not to suppose that, because they have to count out money, that they can bolt with it — not to imagine that any fool can become a successful thief — not to give, way to the terrible delusion that makes any meditated crime seem easy and secure." " Ex-Banker" writes to the Age as follows : — "Banks find by experience that they have a, hundred applicants for every vacancy at whatever salary they choose to give. They pay their general managers a very large salary, and in return these gentlemen are expected to make largo profits, which cannot always be done in the present state of banking competition, if the officials are paid full value for their work. While the world lasts the ' strong will oppress the weak, and the weak hate the strong.' Such is my experience in Colonial banks at any rate ; and I just ask the parents of respectable lads to pause and consider ere they put their sons into these establishments. I believe 111 1 may assert, without fear of contradiction, that there is no occupation, in proportion to the number employed, from which so many fly in disgust. The country is full'of ex-bankers, and I have no doubt that many have been driven to evil courses by the heartlessness of their employers."

Chief or General Manager £1700 to £3500 Assistant Manager and Manager 800 to 2000 Accountant 400 to 700 Tellers 250 to 450 Ledger Keepers 150 to 400 Ordinary Clerks 150 to 300 Junior Clerks 50 to 150