Is the bank messing with me or this is just ordinary incompetence?

In My Humble Opinion
1

My father died a while back and now we’re getting around to settling his estate. It turns out he had a savings account in his name and mine which had a total of a little more than $100,000 in it. The procedure for getting the money is simple. All you need to do is send the bank a notarized letter telling them to close the account and to send you a check. And you have to include a copy of your driver’s license.

Well I did all that about four weeks ago. On Tuesday I figured it was time to follow up on it so I called the bank. The woman I spoke with - not sure what her title is, but I had to address the letter to her - curtly told me that the letter never arrived. No apologies for losing it. No acknowledgment that it was possibly their fault. She told me to send it again via fax. So I re-wrote the letter and went back to the notary and faxed it to her early Wednesday AM. I also sent a follow-up email. At the end of the day she responded to my email saying that my driver’s license didn’t come thorugh clearly and I’d have to re-send it.

This morning (Thursday) at 7:30 AM I faxed the driver’s license again with another follow-up email saying if there’s any problem contact me ASAP. I called at about 3:30 PM to make sure she got the fax and to see if there was any problem. Now she said that they want the original letter, a fax is not good enough. I asked her when she was going to tell me this and she said “Today. I was going to send you an email today.”

I asked to speak to the bank manager and I was told he wasn’t available. I left a message for him to call me back immediately. In the meantime I did a quick internet search and found the relevant regulatory agency is the Office of Thrift Supervision. I called back and said I’m filing a complaint with the OTS if this isn’t resolved immediately. Miraculously the manager’s phone call ended at that very moment and I did get to speak to him. He was polite, at least, but I’m still at square one. I have to mail them the original if I want the money. All the BS about faxing and re-faxing was a waste of my time.

Now I know I can put this in perspective. It’s not their fault that it’s a pain for me to get to a notary and a fax, so all they did was waste a few days of my time. Not so awful, after I let it sit for a month without follow-up. And I’m inclined to believe that I just just got a rude dumb employee to work with. No big deal.

But I’m wondering. Would a bank ever deliberately screw this up so they could hold on to the money for a few more weeks? I’d think not, but would like to hear from any insiders about the possibility.

2

IaNaBanker, but IMnsHO, when money’s involved some people will do anything.

3

Now, I don’t practice law in the banking area, but I am fairly certain that if your name is on the bank account, you needn’t do anything particularly special with the account to get the money. Its already yours. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard of bill collectors grabbing dad’s savings because junior had outstanding debts or junior grabbed dad’s davings because he had outstanding debt.

If this is a checking account, write out the check to another account and have done with it. Otherwise, sign up for online banking and transfer it out of there.

The clerk is probably incompetent and/or a power mad bureaucrat trying to give you some grief for switching stuff around.

Good luck.

cj

4

Both.

I agree with cj finn. I’ve been hassled by a bank when trying to close an account. I responded by writing a check to deposit in a different bank for the whole dollar amount, and left Bank of America with a 28 cent gift.

5

If you haven’t already mailed the letter to the bank - mail it certified with return receipt requested. That way you have proof that it was delivered and on what date.

6

Since this is a savings account your only options are: A) go in person to a branch of that bank, withdraw the balance and close the account or B) send a notarized letter telling the bank to close the account and mail you a check for the balance. This much the S&L got right.

The fax business sounds like incompetence. Financial institutions generally will not accept a faxed document to authorize a withdrawal transaction of any kind unless there is a prior agreement on file. This one the manager got right, after the other employee screwed up.

If the S&L is of any size, your $100k is a drop in the bucket to them. Holding your funds one more day may net them another $8 in investment income - not even equal to a rounding error on their books. That being the case, I’m going to say the rest of your experience sounds like poor customer service.

I second the idea that all corrospondence be sent certified mail, return receipt. Good luck!

7

Thanks for the input. I’m pretty optimistic we’ll settle this by next week.

8

I’d have gone to the bank in person unless a huge distance was involved.

9

1500 miles