HSBC Bank limits large cash withdrawals without proof of intent.

[Deleted]

Your reason could be you have a fetish about closing accounts and you could still close it.. Dont think a bank can legally keep you from closing an account with them.

Need the money for having money please give me money.

[Raptor With a Saber]

'I'm going to buy a vault and lots of gold coins and swim about in it like scrooge mcduck.'

Need the money for having money please give me money.

Yeah those should work..really unless theirs some stupid law in place don't think they can stop you.

[Mormolyce]

I work in banking and I think this sounds Orwellian (if true).

Also I suspect this is actually anti-money laundering rather than any "greed" on the part of the banks. AML legislation is really excessive.

[IIamaKing]

Yeh, if my bank did this, it would not be my bank any longer.

[satimy]

Can you just close your account? Wouldn't they then be forced to give you the money?

[Monkeynuts]

I work in banking and I think this sounds Orwellian (if true).

Also I suspect this is actually anti-money laundering rather than any "greed" on the part of the banks. AML legislation is really excessive.

While its 99.99% certain that you're correct and this is AML related, you can't possibly tell that to the general public - they'd have to be willing to accept that every action taken by a bank isn't because of 'TEH EBIL GREEDY BANKERS!!11!' and I just don't think they're quite level headed enough to understand that, and it hardly makes such a nice attention grabbing headline either - 'HSBC limits large cash withdrawals without an explanation for the transaction in order to aid in fight against financial crime' doesn't sound quite as good as 'HSBC WONT GIVE YOU YOUR MONEY UNLESS YOU TELL THEM ALL YOUR SECRETS OMG'.

[obdigore]

While its 99.99% certain that you're correct and this is AML related, you can't possibly tell that to the general public - they'd have to be willing to accept that every action taken by a bank isn't because of 'TEH EBIL GREEDY BANKERS!!11!' and I just don't think they're quite level headed enough to understand that, and it hardly makes such a nice attention grabbing headline either - 'HSBC limits large cash withdrawals without an explanation for the transaction in order to aid in fight against financial crime' doesn't sound quite as good as 'HSBC WONT GIVE YOU YOUR MONEY UNLESS YOU TELL THEM ALL YOUR SECRETS OMG'.

To be fair, the bank admitted they didn't bother notifying anyone of the change, they just told their tellers about the new requirements.

[Monkeynuts]

To be fair, the bank admitted they didn't bother notifying anyone of the change, they just told their tellers about the new requirements.

Oh I'm not saying that they did everything correctly, they certainly didn't by a long shot and they really don't have grounds to REFUSE withdrawals if you don't give a reason; it's just that the motivation behind the activity is certainly a legitimate one and (I'd at least like to think) done for the right reasons rather than to 'just be an arse' and to 'fight to hold on to your money'.

I think somebody else posted about them not actually having the funds around and needing to order the money in under the impression that the Bank doesn't actually have enough money to do these transactions? That certainly isnt the case but there are rules governing just how much cash branches are allowed to have on site and they do have to bring in the cash from service centres to facilitate large withdrawals.

[Cthulhu 2020]

A bank is a private entity, they can do what they want. If you don't like it, move your money out.

Admittedly when I changed banks awhile back because I no longer liked BoA, they stalled and made me jump through hoops to get my money out, then had a hard time closing the account, but I got it out and canceled my account eventually.

[Deleted]

A bank is a private entity, they can do what they want.

Persons are private entitys too and they can't do what they want they too don't requiere a state issued license to operate.

[Deleted]

A bank is a private entity, they can do what they want. If you don't like it, move your money out.

Admittedly when I changed banks awhile back because I no longer liked BoA, they stalled and made me jump through hoops to get my money out, then had a hard time closing the account, but I got it out and canceled my account eventually.

It's nice and easy to say to move the money out, but when the bank doesn't give 'em out it's darn hard :P
And yea, I'm pretty sure this is against the law in quite a few countries.

[Cthulhu 2020]

"Vote with your money" is a pretty retarded saying for a lot of things, but in this case I'd imagine enough people would do it for them to redact.

[lockedout]

I think somebody else posted about them not actually having the funds around and needing to order the money in under the impression that the Bank doesn't actually have enough money to do these transactions? That certainly isnt the case

I have cashed checks from 1k-180k+ and any check over or around 8k the money had to be ordered and I had to come in the next day. Banks do not carry large amounts of money. I am not saying as an institution the bank can't cash the check just as a branch they don't have that kind of money on hand, plus be able to do their daily banking.

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A bank is a private entity, they can do what they want. If you don't like it, move your money out.

Admittedly when I changed banks awhile back because I no longer liked BoA, they stalled and made me jump through hoops to get my money out, then had a hard time closing the account, but I got it out and canceled my account eventually.

I hate bank of america! No 24 hour customer service, what is this the 80's?
I just closed my account there last week, honestly the worst bank I have ever used.
I now use TD bank, they are pretty good.
All in all I hate banks!

[Orlong]

Several HSBC customers in England have complained of being stopped from withdrawing large amounts of their own money because they could not provide proof of what they planned to use it for.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...ls-without-pr/

Should you have to give the bank a reason to withdraw your own money?
Since this happened apparently some/most of the banks changed their policy.

This is why I dont use banks. I keep all my cash in a safe in my home. Nobody but me will tell me when and why I can use my own money

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Credit Unions.

Find one. Hinder any legislative attempt to tax them.

Banks will get the picture.

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Some ATMS do it. And banks tried to pull that shit awhile back for other things though what exactly it was escapes me.

They tried it because the government in its crusade to punish the evil big banks capped swipe fees on merchant credit card transactions and instead of just eating the loss like the foolish governent assumed they would (like they always think when they punish companies with more and more regulations) The banks were going to pass on the loss in the form of a debit card fee.

They backpedaled and increased other fees and many reordered the order in which checks are deducted from your account from largest to smallest so you incurr the largest amount of overdraft fees if you make a miscalculation to make up for it. So now your rent check will hit first and all the small checks will cause $40 overdraft fees each, whereas before the small ones would all go through and then rent check would cause the overdraft and you would only get 1 fee.

[Spectral]

If they made this optional, it'd please me. I don't make big cash withdrawals, ever, so if someone's taking a big chunk out of my account, it's almost certainly fraud and I'd like it stopped. Not allowing a person to make their own decision about how they'd like their account set up is absurd though.

[OJntoast]

I didn't read through all of the responses, but here in the states that would 100% be an AML issue.

Is the bank obligated to give you your money? Yes we are. We are obligated to pay on a check drafted from your account. We are in no way shape or form obligated to give you the balance of your account in cash. Releasing large sums of cash is at the discretion of the bank management, not only for the AML reasons but for the security risks. Individual banks hold less and less cash in them nowadays which has kept bank robberies via hostile takeover low. Realistically there just isn't enough money in most bank locations to justify it.

When someone requests a large sum of cash, I require ID, a reason, and a large currency withdrawal waiver, which pretty much states, as soon as I hand them that cash the bank is no longer liable, someone walks up and punches them in the back of the head while they are standing there its on them.

Word to the wise... Just get a damn bank check.

[Yunru]

I didn't read through all of the responses, but here in the states that would 100% be an AML issue.

Is the bank obligated to give you your money? Yes we are. We are obligated to pay on a check drafted from your account. We are in no way shape or form obligated to give you the balance of your account in cash. Releasing large sums of cash is at the discretion of the bank management, not only for the AML reasons but for the security risks. Individual banks hold less and less cash in them nowadays which has kept bank robberies via hostile takeover low. Realistically there just isn't enough money in most bank locations to justify it.

When someone requests a large sum of cash, I require ID, a reason, and a large currency withdrawal waiver, which pretty much states, as soon as I hand them that cash the bank is no longer liable, someone walks up and punches them in the back of the head while they are standing there its on them.

Word to the wise... Just get a damn bank check.

Thats why robbers attack secured transports now.

[Tonath]

That's not cool, not being able to withdraw your own money, but then again this doesn't surprise me

[Gheld]

I didn't read through all of the responses, but here in the states that would 100% be an AML issue.

Is the bank obligated to give you your money? Yes we are. We are obligated to pay on a check drafted from your account. We are in no way shape or form obligated to give you the balance of your account in cash. Releasing large sums of cash is at the discretion of the bank management, not only for the AML reasons but for the security risks. Individual banks hold less and less cash in them nowadays which has kept bank robberies via hostile takeover low. Realistically there just isn't enough money in most bank locations to justify it.

When someone requests a large sum of cash, I require ID, a reason, and a large currency withdrawal waiver, which pretty much states, as soon as I hand them that cash the bank is no longer liable, someone walks up and punches them in the back of the head while they are standing there its on them.

Word to the wise... Just get a damn bank check.

There's so many cashless transaction options it's not even funny. 100% of which are safer than carrying around a huge wad of cash. So unless somebody is paying a hostage ransom there's really no need for a huge wad of cash. And even then I'm fairly sure hostage takers use western union these days.

EDIT: Also inb4 big evil banks, that's why I use a credit union.

[OneSent]

What's the matter banks, afraid people are going to withdraw more than you're capable of lending out? I'd love to see what would happen if everyone simultaneously demanded their gold.

So, we need proof of what we intend to spend large withdrawals on, but yet the Federal Reserve can no longer prove that there's even anything backing the currency we use.

Okay. Fine. I'll show you proof of what I intend to spend my withdrawals on when the government shows me proof of where my tax dollars go.