Request Letter for Refund of Security Deposit from Landlord Form

I used to have a habit of bumping into celebrities. No, I mean literally. Once, I collided with Natalie Portman as I was leaving Harvard Yard and she was coming back in. I'd been on the phone with a friend at the time, and she and I ran smack into each other under the gateway arch just across from the First Parish church. We exchanged apologies for not watching where we were going, and after a brief moment of small talk (I think she asked me something about what year I was; I replied that I was taking night classes and what she was studying, and the usual Well, it was nice meeting you! and You too!) I kept walking along my way. About 10 steps later, I stopped dead in my tracks, stopped whatever I was saying to my friend at the time, and asked him. 'Wait. Does Natalie Portman have a beauty mark?'He wasn't sure. So he hopped on the internet and searched for me. Sure enough, she did."Dude. The girl I just crashed into. That was her." And silly me, I didn't even realize it.About a year later, while I was working at the Ritz-Carlton Boston (the old one), I was exiting one of the event hall restrooms, opened up the door, and bumped chests with Pauly Shore. But you've got to understand... this is the Pauly Shore as I knew him from the movies:And this was the Pauly Shore I bumped into:So, again, mutual apologies for colliding. I took a look at him, squinted a little, and asked him: "Anyone ever tell you you look like Pauly Shore with short hair?"To which he smirked and replied, "Man, you wouldn't believe how often I hear that."But the best one happened between these two. Before I worked for the Ritz, I worked as a valet manager for a company that handled parking for the hotel. The old Ritz didn't have its own parking, so we used several nearby garages to store cars, and valets ran to pick them up as needed. On occasion, when we were really busy, I ran for cars myself.So here I was, driving up the ramp out of an underground garage in a classic green Jaguar (ok, I admit to revving the engine...), just about to pull through the garage exit, over the sidewalk and onto the street. At the very last moment, somebody strolled out in front of the car. I hit the brakes as hard as I could and came to a stop with a screech that was more of a squeak, and there, a foot from the hood of the car, I saw this face looking at me.I kid you not, this was the exact expression on his face. One corner of his mouth curled up just a tiny bit, and his head jerked with a single short laugh. I know he didn't say it, so it must have been my mind playing tricks, but I heard these words in my head:Go ahead. Make my day.Then he turned back on his way and kept walking.Needless to say, that exit from the garage was closed the next time I had to run for a car, and I had the infamy among friends as the guy who almost ran over Clint Eastwood, the guy whose fellow valets nicknamed Lucky Punk.There was also the time Ozzie Osbourne bowed to me, but that's a story for another night, kiddos.Update: Since a few people have asked, the Ozzie story.There's not much to tell, really. I worked overnights at the old Ritz in Boston. Officially, I was something called a Night Auditor, which meant that part of my job was to review the day's records, look for and flag discrepancies, and print out a whole slew of reports. It also meant I worked the front desk to check in the stragglers, the last minute travelers and late arrivals, and sometimes high-profile individuals arriving after events or just trying to avoid attracting crowds. We didn't have a night manager at the time, so it eventually became my job to handle the upset, the unhappy, the irate and the downright irascible who came down with problems in the night.This included chasing moon-eyed teenagers out of hallways and stairwells after they somehow infiltrated the building looking for this guy named Jack Johnson. I had no idea who he was at the time, turning away the blindest and drunkest guys looking for a public restroom, and yes, occasionally welcoming the Godfather of Heavy Metal to the hotel in the middle of the night.So. There's the setup. We all knew he was arriving late at night, but there wasn't a big to-do about it. My operator wanted to see him, so I had her stand at the front desk, and then I believe the bellman and one of our loss prevention officers were present. My simple job was to stand next to the lobby elevator as the bellman escorted him in through the front doors and say, Good evening, Mr. Osbourne. Welcome to the Ritz-Carlton, Boston! I hope you enjoy your stay!So that's what I did. He was shorter than I expected, but looked pretty much like he looked on his TV show. He clasped his hands together, smiled, and bowed gently in my direction, said, "Thank you," and he and his wife entered the elevator and were whisked to their room. That's that. No bumping into anyone this time, just an extremely gracious greeting!One more final edit: If you're ever a moon-eyed teenager chasing after a celebrity, very very few stay under their own names at hotels, and unless the people at the desk know that 'Mordecai BeetleBrox' in Room 642 is actually the Ex-Galactic President Zaphod Beeblebrox, then, well, he's just zis guy, you know?

There’s a reason drug dealers store cash in storage units and paint buckets, because it’s not easy laundering money. What could Walter have done? Let’s go through his options one by one:Option 1: Although the The Bank Secrecy Act (1970) requires banks to report transactions above $10,000, Walter could have employed Smurfs (drug mules, but for cash) to make thousands of tiny deposits, which would draw less attention from authorities.Problem: Walter did not have a criminal organization to carry this out. What’s he going to do if a smurf runs off with his money, send Jesse after him with a bong?Option 2: Buy high-ticket items such as vintage comic books or supercars and sell them later.Problem: Similar to the Bank Secrecy Act, businesses have to file a Form 8300, “Report of Cash Payments Over $10,000 Received in a Trade or Business”. Even if those reports don’t alarm the IRS, the large transfers from other people who he would sell the goods would raise red flags, and he’s back to square one.Option 3: Get the money out of the country through casinos or smuggling diamonds.Problem: Even if Walter succeeds in laundering the money while overseas (gamble at a casino and cash out the chips in Macau, for example), he still needs to deposit the clean money at a foreign bank. Unfortunately for Walt, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (2010) requires Americans living outside the U.S. to file yearly reports on their non-U.S. financial accounts to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FINCEN). Banks outside the U.S. are required to fill out a “Know Your Customer” form when you open an account – someone like Walter would immediately raise concerns. This is why many banks in Europe won’t even let Americans open a bank account.Option 4: Invest in the stock market as the OP suggests.Problem: Same thing, any brokerage firm would be obligated to file a Suspicious activity report (SAR) if Walter were to make large deposits that is not commensurate with his income as a high school chemistry teacher.Option 5: Hire a “professional” to do the money laundering, there must be a smart guy who knows how to set up “offshore” bank accounts and stuff.Problem: Money Laundering Control Act (1986) makes money laundering a crime in itself instead of just an element of another crime, so even Saul Goodman would think twice about getting involved with money laundering. And as for finding an export, in 1996, Harvard-educated economist Franklin Jurado was sentenced to 7 1/2 years in prison for laundering $36m for a Colombian cartel.Conclusion: Money laundering was always an afterthought for Walter – he was too busy dealing with the day-to-day stuff of manufacturing and distributing drugs. Walter might have been able to launder that $100m if he had devoted more time and resources into the project, but ultimately, the results might not necessarily be better than burying the money in the desert. His goal was to provide for his family, and barrels of money in the desert does exactly that.—————Edit 1: A few comments have mentioned smuggling the cash (or converted to gold) out to to other countries. I think somehow the idea of the “open sea” implies lawlessness, but it doesn’t. The U.S. Custom and Border Protection has strict Reporting Requirements for pleasure boats, not to mention inspections. If that weren’t the case, people would be smuggling drugs willy-nilly across U.S. borders. However, I’m reminded of the 2001 Movie Heist, starring Gene Hackman as a con-artist. At the very end of the movie, spoiler alert, he took the elicit gold bars, melt them into yacht rails and painted over them, thus avoiding detection.Edit 2: Remi Alaiti pointed out that Saul Goodman did offer to help them launder the money through nail salons (as we know now he got the idea from his Jimmy McGill days), so I stand corrected. However, like the car wash, the nail salon would be too small potatoes to make a signNow dent laundering the $80m.Edit 3: As for Bitcoins, it’s less secure than burying money in the desert. See Jonathan Chen's answer to Should I invest in Bitcoin? for details.*I maintain that Walter original purpose for manufacturing was to provide for his family, thus the money would’ve had to stay in the country. In time, if his wife and son were on board, they could’ve opened more car washes, nail salons, and other cash-heavy businesses, say, Los Pollos Hermanos franchises, to slowly launder the money.

What you experience as a teller seems to vary on not only the bank you work for, but the branch you work in. For instance, my experience as a teller is probably very different than those in a lot of other bank branches because I work at a branch that has a lot of higher end clientele. We do a lot more catering and hand-holding than other branches do, and sometimes have to bend the rules a little to get things done.My day starts with me putting up my stuff in a secure area in the break room. If I’m opening, I disarm the alarms and do the morning walk-through with another teller. Then we deal with all the daily duties like getting the work together from earlier that week to send to the main office, putting together the sell for the armored truck, or auditing one of the many machines or vaults we have.I get out my drawer, boot everything up, finish putting the Nightdrops in the system, and then I wait. The morning is usually slow, so we spend a lot of time talking and trying to entertain ourselves… or trying not to fall asleep. Businesses show up a little later in the morning usually or throughout the day. And from there its an array of change orders, trying to sort out the mass of bills and checks sometimes neatly put together and sometimes crammed in a bag with such little care that it could take you 5–10 mins just to sort into some sort of order. But you get through all that and then you wait some more… and you wait some more…. and you wait some more… Given, a lot of branches are actually busy, so there is very little waiting involved, and much more trying not to lose your mind. But this is my branch.There’s a lot of checks being cashed, checks and bills being deposited, and people asking what their balance is. You get the occasional person bringing in their change to cash out. Or you get to let someone into their safe deposit box. That’s all the easy part of being a teller.The hard part is the questions you have to answer and the regulations that you have to follow. Telling people “I’m sorry I can’t do that,” and then having to try and explain why, because they don’t understand. It’s a lot of filling out forms. If I had a dollar for every slip I’ve had to fill out for someone I would’ve nearly doubled my paycheck every month. All of that is monotonous, though. And it can drive you crazy after a while. But the part of my job I really enjoy are those rare instances when I feel like I can actually really help someone. To put in the extra mile and teach someone who’s concerned about counterfeit 20s in her yard sale how to tell the difference between what’s real and what’s fake. To teach someone who doesn’t know English very well how to write out English numbers on his checks so he can pay his employees. It’s painstakingly going through every transaction with someone on their banking statement and showing them the result until they’re satisfied. It’s teaching high school kids how to fill out their first bank deposit form. It’s letting someone know their driver’s license is about to expire. It’s always been the small things that really make the job worth doing to me.But in between all of that, there are the vast arrays of paperwork that have to be done every day. Phone calls for all the check, debit card, and foreign currency orders. Followed by writing out hold logs. Trying to fill private banking’s little tasks. Occasional product phone calls can be assigned, which can take anywhere from one minute to an hour and thirty depending on the number of calls and the type. There’s filling out the occasional credit card application for a customer or a direct deposit request form. Then there’s the federal reporting forms that have to be filled out occasionally depending on the circumstance. In our branch, we also get a large amount of loan work that gets sent our way, so that takes up some time as well—completing their transactions and being essentially front-line secretaries. There are of course sales goals to fill, but at least in my bank, my job doesn’t rely on me signNowing my goal.Even with all that seriousness, some of it can be very funny. Like the truck who ran over lane 4. Or the fact that our ATM is constantly on the fritz and has a taste for eating people’s checks. Or when we’ve accidentally sent two tubes to the same lane. Or that guy who came in wanting to withdrawal $2000 in 1s for a wedding… or someone who chose to deposit an entire tub full of coin. There are days when I go home wanting to scream, and then there are days when I smile from ear to ear, but in the end, I love my job. It may not be an end game for me, but I have very few complaints. I work for a good company, and for now, that’s good enough for me.As for advice… the only thing I can tell you is… try to find joy in the small things. Be kind and people will often be kind to you.

My son attended MIT. We are an average middle class family. I am a public schoolteacher and my wife is a home daycare provider. My son grew up as a normal kid. He played neighborhood sports, guitar, and enjoyed school. Even though we recognized his passion for learning, we never thought of him as a genius and neither did he, even though he graduated validictorian from both middle and high school.I recognized his drive early in life, to see how things worked and his ideas of improving them, tinkering with them, etc. He decided he wanted to major in some form of engineering so, when he was in his Junior year of high school, we started visiting many of the local and regional colleges that specialized in this. After visiting Worcester Polytechnic and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institutes (among others) I suggested we visit MIT. He agreed but asked me if we were wasting our time as he then added "...because I'll never get in..."We chose a day for our visit and, as we were touring the campus, he looked at me and said "I could see myself here." I suggested we pick up an admissions application so we stopped at the admissions office. When he saw that it would cost $50.00 to submit the application (and knowing finances were tight due to bills I had incurred as a result of a spinal cord injury which rendered me a paraplegic) he said "Dad, don't waste your money. I'll never get in here." I told him to think of it like placing a bet in a casino. Take a shot because you don't know what the outcome will be.He filled out the application and took his SATs scoring (at that time) in the low 700s out of a possible 800 (low by MIT standards). He passed his interviews and settled in for the wait. He soon received the news by email that he had been wait-listed. I could see his disappointment as he showed me the letter and said "Well, I tried. I told you they wouldn't accept me."I told him that there was one more thing he could try if he really wanted that school. He could send an email to admissions thanking them for considering him and telling them that if he was removed from wait list and accepted in the second round that he would definitely attend MIT. Meanwhile, I sent in a non-refundable $500.00 deposit to his second choice school, Worcester Polytechnic.Two weeks later, he called me to look at his computer. I told him I was busy and he said, "Dad, you really have to see this." I wheeled in to the room to see an e-mail posted on the screen which stated in part, "Congratulations, you have been accepted to MIT...". He printed a copy to show my wife as we both stood there shocked. I tried my best not to cry as I hugged him and told him "See, I knew you could do it.." (even though I too privately had my doubts).He now started to get scared. He voiced such concerns as what if he couldn't make it, what if the work was too hard, if he was MIT material why didn't he make the first cut, what about the $500.00 deposit I would lose at Worcester Polytechnic, etc.I told him both his mom and I believed in him and if he wanted different perspectives, perhaps he could talk to his high school teachers (who all encouraged him not to pass up the opportunity). I told him that if at any time he felt he just could not do it, to come to me and we could consider another school of his choice. After a week of soul searching, he decided to go. His first year was hard and he thought about leaving several times, but he persevered and saw it through. MIT has a mantra which states "Work, Sleep, Party...pick 2". He somehow rotated through all 3 and survived.He graduated 3 and 1/2 years later with a degree in mechanical engineering. He had the highest average in his major and won the Presidential Award which, together with work study, enabled him to attend MIT a second time to secure his Master's degree at little cost. A professor with whom he had worked during his 6 years of attendance rewarded him with a free ride to obtain his doctorate, again at MIT. I still get a lump in my throat thinking of him graduating in his Doctoral robes.His first entry level job, chosen for its opportunities and not solely for it monetary rewards, started him at over $100,000 annual salary. He has published numerous studies and articles and now works on various projects, for both private companies and individuals. If a child needing heart surgery is able to have it performed without the doctor having to crack open his/her chest, thank my son. One of his first important inventions was the development of a device to do this arthroscopically.I say this to every teenager who reads this. If you are MIT material, they will know when you apply. If you really want an MIT degree, seize the moment and believe in yourself. It is a powerful experience you will never forget (nor will your parents--I still get emotional every time I relate this story) and you will make friends that will influence your life from all over the world. (I still remember the time my son took a Princess from India home to spend the Christmas holidays with us and she and my wife made pizza together in the kitchen.). Many times our dining room would be filled with students from all over the world but when they talked about their subjects in school they lapsed into a common language that my wife and I seldom understood. We used to say they were talking in tongues.Yes, MIT is an opportunity many wish for and few get. Make the most of it and don't let it pass you by.(By the way, I never did get back that $500.00 deposit from Worcester Polytechnic though, in retrospect, I consider it money well spent.)Update: I just wanted to take a moment to thank the readers for their kind comments and upvotes. Hopefully this post will make a difference in the lives of readers who are considering applying.

Departments of education and school districts always have to make decisions about what to include in their curriculum.  There are a lot of life skills that people need that aren't taught in school.  The question is should those skills be taught in schools?I teach high school, so I'll talk about that.  The typical high school curriculum is supposed to give students a broad-based education that prepares them to be citizens in a democracy and to be able to think critically.  For a democracy to work, we need educated, discerning citizens with the ability to make good decisions based on evidence and objective thought.  In theory, people who are well informed about history, culture, science, mathematics, etc., and are capable of critical, unbiased thinking, will have the tools to participate in a democracy and make good decisions for themselves and for society at large.  In addition to that, they should be learning how to be learners, how to do effective, basic research, and collaborate with other people.  If that happens, figuring out how to do procedural tasks in real life should not provide much of a challenge.  We can't possibly teach every necessary life skill people need, but we can help students become better at knowing how to acquire the skills they need.  Should we teach them how to change a tire when they can easily consult a book or search the internet to find step by step instructions for that?  Should we teach them how to balance a check book or teach them how to think mathematically and make sense of problems so that the simple task of balancing a check book (which requires simple arithmetic and the ability to enter numbers and words in columns and rows in obvious ways) is easy for them to figure out.  If we teach them to be good at critical thinking and have some problem solving skills they will be able to apply those overarching skills to all sorts of every day tasks that shouldn't be difficult for someone with decent cognitive ability  to figure out.  It's analogous to asking why a culinary school didn't teach its students the steps and ingredients to a specific recipe.  The school taught them about more general food preparation and food science skills so that they can figure out how to make a lot of specific recipes without much trouble.  They're also able to create their own recipes.So, do we want citizens with very specific skill sets that they need to get through day to day life or do we want citizens with critical thinking, problem solving, and other overarching cognitive skills that will allow them to easily acquire ANY simple, procedural skill they may come to need at any point in their lives?

Hi, To give a little more context, if you are worried about completing a direct deposit form, which should be for receiving remuneration of your wages, then request a your employment contract and tell them you will complete the direct deposit form after the employment has been received. Always be open and honest with a potential em0ployer and set parameters for your employment relationship from the get go. you would like to follow procedures. Every Employer will respect you more for that. I do not think it is fishy but a little odd

Metropolitan Police Academy. Academy training for recruit officers lasts for 28 weeks.

Special Police Officers & Training: ... They are privately commissioned police officers with full arrest powers within an area or premises which the officer has been employed to protect.

Your landlord is entitled to deduct any unpaid rent from your deposit. ... You may decide to withhold the last month's rent in case the landlord refuses to return the deposit. This is not advisable. You are legally liable to pay rent and your landlord could take you to court to recover any unpaid rent which you owe.

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Here are average hourly rates for security guards against a full-service security company: Basic unarmed guard: $15-$20 per hour. Basic armed guard: $20-$25 per hour. Unarmed guard with advanced skills and experience: $30-$35 per hour.