At the bank this morning they patiently explained their inability to do a particular thing what wanted doing because of “security.”  I had a flash back to an analogous experience at a bank in the early 1970s. Thought at that time the explanation was “our insurance company won’t let us do that.”  Both then and now I suspect the real reason was “our software sucks.”

Both excuses, insurance-company-rules and security-rules, resolve the question by introducing an immovable object into the discussion.  Using security is better than the insurance company because it implies that the immovable object serves our both the bank and my interests.

There is a whole craft of objection handling.