Banks at fault or are you?

[Lancer]

The bank cashed the checks which didn't bear your sig. I thought that always meant it was the banks fault.

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Banking/BetterBanking/BanksHangFraudVictimsHighanddry.aspx

[Proteus_MST]

Hm,
in case of the Hendersons it sound like she was careless,
giving the thief opportunity to get access to both,
her debit card and her cheque-book.
So, at least in part, it was her fault.

(Signatures btw. seem to be a very unsafe proof of identity, after all they are easy to forge if you have a sample of a persons writings)

[Victor Galis]

This is part of the reason I don't believe in checks.

[Dis]

couldn't a person just sign a check in someone else's name in an attempt to get out of paying for something?

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Dis
couldn't a person just sign a check in someone else's name in an attempt to get out of paying for something?

They can but that sounds like a criminal attempt to defraud

So you risk jail to avoid paying for stuff?

Its easier just to skip out on your credit cards

[Aabraxan]

I agree w/ Flubber that it sounds like fraud. What bothers me about the article is that it appears that the bank kept the account open and kept processing transactions even after being put on notice of the fraudulent activity.

[snoopy369]

Actually, that's not how I read it. The bank kept the account 'open' because there were overdraft charges (that keep piling up!) and if they close the account, they lose the additional overdraft charges.

The bank was technically within the law to do what it did. Technically, but barely. It sounds like horrible customer service, frankly, and I'd hope that the Hendersons discouraged their friends from banking with that bank.

The bank is required to investigate the fraud, but if it finds no evidence of fraud, to ITS satisfaction, it does not have to refund you the money. Now, that does not end HER rights, particularly in court, but the problem is that it is her obligation to find the criminal at that point... as the only person she has redress from, if the bank chooses not to reimburse her, is the criminal.

Yet another reason to never keep large amounts of money in one's checking account. Always have a savings account set up parallel to your checking account that stores the majority of monies accrued, even if only for a few weeks at a time. It is much, much less likely that you would have a fraudulent withdrawl from the savings account, than from checking, as you don't usually give out ANY information on the savings account, and criminals don't look for it (unless they're doing a much more thorough fraud). Any major bank nowadays has instant internet transfers between the two, and as long as your internet PIN is seperate from your bank card PIN, it's unlikely for both to be stolen

[Aabraxan]

I may be wrong about the sequence of events. I almost added a disclaimer to my last post about my that. Maybe I should have. Frankly, I'd be furious if my checks got stolen and the bank refused to close the acccount and kept collecting NSF charges on fraudulent checks.

[Zkribbler]

I haven't seen a whole lot of cases involving checks, but IIRC, the bank is 100% liable for cashing your checks without your signature.

I can understand the position of banks when the "victim" and the thief are in a conspiracy, but this plainly is not the case here. Not when the account holders (a) report the theft of their checks and (b) ask for their account to be closed. And the bank refuses?!

So as I see it, the victims were victimized (1) by the thief; (2) by the bank, and (3) by the company they went to in order to fix the problem. Who knows what this companies qualifications are--but they attempted to "negotiate" (i.e. beg) for some of the money back?! That's not when you need some untrained polite self-appointed negotiator; it's when you need some bad-arsed attorney to grab the bank by the lables and explain what happened to greedy banks who steal their depositors' money.

[Lancer]

Either way, that's a bank from hell.

"I haven't seen a whole lot of cases involving checks, but IIRC, the bank is 100% liable for cashing your checks without your signature."

This has always been my perception. In fact I read that some guy wrote a check on the side of a pig and his bank had to cash it because the pig carried his sig.

[Proteus_MST]

Hm,
I didn´t read anywhere in the article that the checks didn´t bear her signature, therefore I assume they did so (i.e. bear a forged signature of her)

[Lancer]

A forged sig is a sig of her?

[Proteus_MST]

I think in the eyes of the banks, the answer will probably be yes,
as it is hard to tell a forged signature from an genuine one.

And, therefore in the eyes of the bank the burden of proof
that a certain check was forged very probably lies within the customer.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Lancer
I read that some guy wrote a check on the side of a pig and his bank had to cash it because the pig carried his sig.

By the time it got run through the check cancelling machine, it was probably bacon.

MMmmMMmMMmmMmmmm bacon.

[Lancer]

Pig cashing...

http://www.usfca.edu/pj/articles/ThePractice2.htm