The call usually starts politely. Someone from “the fraud department” says they’ve noticed unusual activity on your account, and they just need to confirm a one-time PIN to stop it. Or it’s your grandson, sounding upset, saying he’s been in an accident and needs money transferred before the police get involved. Or it’s SARS, apparently, […]

Your daughter needs new textbooks before term starts. Your father needs someone to sit with him three afternoons a week, ever since he fell in the kitchen in March and nobody wants to say out loud what could have happened if it had been near the stove. Both bills land in the same week. Neither […]