A page on
CardPac which allows permament
messages to be left regarding the
account.
There are a couple of problems with this page, though:
The field itself is not exactly enormous. It's probably 40 characters across by about 15 down, for only 600 bytes. Sure, you can write even more notes another time, but it's easiest to compress the data.
Without using GZip, the easiest way is losing vowels, and abbreviations. For example:
f/s dtd 090701 frm b&e, tot mnthy inc £974 (1 wg,
dla, ch ben), tot mnthy exp £860 (£310 mort, £120 hkeep),
£98 avail to dist bet 6 crdtrs tot £10202.44, acpt
prorata ofr £7.12, snt cab10., which translates as:
Financial statement dated 9th July 2001 from Baines and Ernst, total monthy inc £974 (1 wage, disability living allowance, child benefit), total monthy expenditure £860 (£310 mortgage, £120 housekeeping, £98 available a month to distribute between 6 creditors totalling £10202.44, accept pro-rata offer of £7.12 a month, sent system letter to Baines and Ernst to acpt for 6 months.
On OCMI, the viewing screen, it all appears upside down, with no spaces between the entries. The lines at the bottom are the oldest, the lines at the top are the newest. So it appears as:
prorata ofr £7.12, snt cab10.
£98 avail to dist bet 6 crdtrs tot £10202.44, acpt
dla, ch ben), tot mnthy exp £860 (£310 mort, £120 hkeep),
f/s dtd 090701 frm b&e, tot mnthy inc £974 (1 wg,
Each person has their own individual style, and is writing about their own particular part, using their own terminology (an ATD is the same as a LOA which is a letter of authority for the third party to deal with the customer, L/A is sometimes used, and sometimes it is only implied, or on a different page all together), some write in ALL CAPS, others abbreviate harshly... all in all, it ends up a mess.
Also, the messages are permament: they cannot be removed. If you accidently press Enter too soon (and it has to be Enter, next to Delete on the Numeric Keypad, not Return), usually when typing in a figure, it is submitted. It cannot be altered: you just have to apologise to the reader and carry on...
It's fun, working in Financial Services.