Chase & "dormant" accounts

I went to Chase and had a nice chat with personal banker and local manager. They indicated it is a State of Illinois law - I searched, but could not find an online copy of the Illinois Banking Act. The time period is 11 months. The law does not count interest as activity, but only real deposits/withdrawals. What they have done in the past to circumvent this situation is to setup some small auto-deposit amounts ($10) every 6 months from a checking account to keep the other savings account active.

Just thought I would share.... in case one of your Quicken accounts suddenly falls off the map, like mine did last night.

Much of the blame for this is YOUR STATES Escheat Laws( which demands Dormant accounts to be SURRENDERED to the STATE, as you have "ABANDONED" it! Some banks , charge (deduct from your account) 5o cents, or a $1 a year , to get your attention, and to circumvent this. Tho Escheat normally takes place 5 - 7 years after these accounts show no activity. a good practice is to move funds, or other activity on EVERY account you own at least once a year. IF a state Escheats your account (for your own "Protection" (ha ha), it may be reclaimed from the state, BUT there may be FEES involved (to "Prove " that you are "Entitled" to those funds! The states LOVE escheat, as this is an INTEREST FREE LOAN to them! Only OTHER way to avoid this is to bury your money in the First National Bank of your Nearest River (or mattress)?? As info, Jim

Hi, P.

As a very junior auditor nearly 50 years ago, one of my first audits was of a small bank in Oklahoma. A standard auditing technique then (and maybe still) was to confirm a sample of deposit accounts, especially dormant accounts. That is, we would mail a letter to the depositor asking him/her to confirm to us that, yes, that account was theirs and that the amount agreed with their own records. Most of the replies were routine, but one was from an elderly lady who said, "Thank you for reminding me. I forgot that I had that money in there!" That savings account had not been touched - except by interest added - for several years. The balance was about $14,000 - and that was in 1960!

It was several years later that I first heard the word "escheat". As someone else said, it was common for banks to levy a monthly or other periodic surcharge on dormant accounts; given a long enough time, this would eventually wipe out the balance in most accounts, eliminating the "dormant account problem".

Every year, the controller or treasurer or other official of most states publishes a list of "unclaimed accounts". These are assets that have escheated to the state because the owners cannot be located. The bank or other holder is not allowed to simply expropriate the asset, but must turn it over to the state, which will hold it until the owner can be located and identified and can claim the property. When I lived in California, we were amused that the state officials were unable to locate Bob Hope, Doris Day and several other well-known owners of such accounts. Here in Texas, each year's list usually includes several prominent citizens.

One more anecdote on this subject: When we moved from California in 1080, we closed our bank accounts there, but a miscalculation by the Bank of America left us with one cent in my wife's checking account. For several months, she continued to get the monthly statement showing that penny balance. Finally, BofA sent her a Cashier's Check for $0.01 to close the account. She was too embarrassed to ask some teller to cash that small check, so I did it for her. Having been on the other side of the desk, I did not want that account to show up on the bank's list every month for years - and some poor clerk have to reconcile it.

RC

"R. C. White" wrote in news:13suvt9gj2gv3d3 @corp.supernews.com:

Let me be the first to congratulate you on your longevity, R. C. Quite impressive, LOL.

Hi, Han.

Yeah, I burst out laughing this morning when I read my own post. ;^}

It should have said 1980, of course. I'm old, but not OLD!

RC

I wonder if you could just open two savings accounts and set them up to auto-deposit to each other?

My bank understands the difference between "inactive" and "abandoned". They send a list of their "inactive" (for 7 years) accounts to the bank officers who line off the ones that they personally know are not "abandoned". So it helps to say hello to your banker when you run into him/her on the street.

Rick

I had one share of stock in a company that paid a quarterly dividend of $0.25. They did not have direct deposit available. After I moved to CA from TX, I discovered I had $0.25 in unclaimed funds in the State of Texas. I filled out the paperwork, probably spent $0.50 (postage was much cheaper then) and got my check for $0.25. Foolish - perhaps - but I did not want the State of Texas to have my money forever!

I had the same problem with dormant accounts disappearing. My solution was to set up a small automatic transfer from checking to savings. The bank counts this transaction as "activity." I transfer $25 each month, but I suppose the amount could be smaller and the frequency just short of the time period needed to keep the account active.

This issue still exists today nothing has changed from Chase. My money market account disappeared overnight last week due to no activity on my end.

So I too have seen a number of personal accounts (not just Chase) go 'dormant' (I think the correct banking terminology is 'inactive'). But it is bigger than Quicken. Different state laws exist for this, but in some states, as short as a year, if an account is inactive, the state can claim the funds as 'unclaimed', then you really have a hassle at getting them.

So the easy 'fix' to this (which I use) is simply deposit $1 or so in each account you own in January. It's not that difficult, and there's a lot of higher priority fish to fry.