I had a weird thing happen at the bank this morning.

I went into a bank that I have been doing business with for over twenty years and walked up to a teller that I have done business with for at least fifteen years. My mission was to move payroll money from savings to checking, an amount and process that I have done every month for at least fifteen years.

I gave the teller my deposit and withdrawal slips and all of the appropriate paperwork. She took it and entered them into the system. We waited and waited and waited and finally I said, 'If I didn't know the money was there you would be making me nervous.' Her reply was that she was no longer allowed to transfer the amount I was asking to move, and was waiting for the manager to come over and OK the transaction. It has come to this? My deposits in that bank were ten times the amount of the transfer! I can't wait for the day when the manager says that I can not get access to my funds. I have pondered many things about the position we are in but this was not one of them. I walked out with an eerie feeling that I doubt will ever pass. I am beginning to understand why the folks who lived through the first Depression never had the feeling leave them.

I realized during the past several months that
the big banks don't care about their customers
at all.

That's why I moved to the credit union, and I
love it.

an option for everyone. At least that's what I've been told!

I'm pretty sure it's REALLY so they can make money off the float period somehow.

So THEY can earn interest off the check for a few days before they let YOU have the money.

You may be right. I just thought of all the regulations regarding transfer of $10K or more. A lot of these regulations were put in place allegedly to catch drug transfers.

I've been out of the business for almost 20 years but I'm not aware of any government-imposed regulations regarding transfers from one account to another within the same instituation.

That $10,000 report is for cash only I regularly cash checks for more than that and never run into any reporting requirements....

I thought it concerned anything over $10K, including transferring money between accounts.

She seemed to act like it was a bank thing. This is a small local bank that has always had good ratings so it was all very odd. When I told her that I didn't take it personally she said the she did! After the Patriot Act bull*hit was initiated I was very vocal at the bank about the regulations. They used to give me the eye for speaking out. It is strange to see that the folks on the other side of the counter have finally woken up!

I went to make a deposit. The check was substantial and was from my stock brokerage account. The teller asked me if I had been expecting the check. Strange question. I said "of course, why do you ask?" She said because of fraud problems they check everyone who makes a large deposit...she had to get the manager's signature.

... seems to me I recall something along those lines. The bank has to report to Big Brother anything "suspicious." Dunno if that enters into what you're talking about, or not?

Doesn't matter if it is a deposit or withdrawal, if it is more than ten grand then a manager is needed. Not sure how long that has been the case but it has been in effect for several years now anyway. :shrug:

Each day there is something to shake the head at!

My daughter worked in banking for quite a few years. I remember her talking about BSA.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_Secrecy_Act

Lucky you, having $100K in the bank.

When the market crashed a year ago, so did my consultancy. Scraping by with one major client.

I used to review internal controls and maybe that background influenced my reaction, but I think it sounds like it's the employee that requires a higher approval, not you. One of the big problems with the credit crisis was lax review and approval procedures for loans. Tellers and other employees of that level may simply need additional approval for certain dollar amount transactions.
I'd definitely ask a manager next time you're there. I'd be curious to know what changed.

that was a reasonably hefty amount. They called the assistant manager, the manager, and then called the head office downtown just to let me deposit the whole thing.

I can see a problem if I was cashing a check like that, especially since this area has a bad reputation for crime. However, depositing it? There was no need for harassment, they could have done any paperwork later.

I told my dad to write smaller checks after that one.

That was ten years ago.

It was only $7,000. Bank of America put a TEN DAY HOLD on the funds. From freaking Fidelity.

from a 401K account I closed. I deposited it at the ATM. Money appeared in my account the next day with no holds on it. Of course, I deposited it into my savings. And this was Bank of America, who others here seem to have had problems with.

Years ago I carried a fairly humongous check (retirement cash out from a company I was leaving) into a bank I had dealt with for years. You'd have thought I was about to defraud every employee in the place.

... that has nothing to do with you and more to do with internal security. The bank I worked for for years would sometimes change its policies like that, limiting what someone who was at the teller level could do. It got to the point where a supervisor had to look at any check, transfer, or w/d over $1000. It's really more for the customer's protection to prevent errors and identify theft and internal fraud. Also, if a customer did more than 3 transactions in a day (and that including PIN w/d or transactions), a supervisor approval was required to be sure it was actually the customer doing the transaction.

It probably had nothing to do with CTR reporting or anything like that. It doesn't sound like a transaction that falls under that.

get their own money.

It's likely to be the amount of your transfer that triggered the cashier's duty to get approval from above. The bank may have imposed some artificial limit for cashiers dealing with such transfers. Maybe something happened in their bank where a transfer was handled sloppily or improperly. I would not assume the process had anything to do with you or your accounts, however.

I suggest you ask your banker directly why the action was taken. If you're not satisfied with the answer, move your banking.