Complaint Review: TD Bank - Patchogue New York

 
The following complaint No. 1354599 was filed with the Comptroller of the Currency.

I opened this account on the first day the Bank came to my area in 2002. It was a DBA account. A new Manager named Donna Maiorino came to the Bank a few years later. About 3 years ago I encountered a situation where they would no longer allow me to cash checks against my account because it was a business account. There was not a lot of checks. This apparently was started by this Manager. These checks were not made out to the business name but to me personally. I know that a check made out to a business has to be deposited. Every other bank that I have asked has said a personal check is no problem. At the time I contacted the Bank's Chairman's office. It was Commerce Bank at that time. Everyone that I spoke to at the headquarters did not see any reason why I could not cash such a check. Their Deposit Account Agreement says they will cash checks against the account. This situation was temporarily resolved when the Bank put a notation on my account stating that I should be able to cash these checks.
I was then able to cash checks for an extended period although I had to call tellers' attention to the notation a couple of times.

 At the beginning of this year I began having the same problem. The Manager again said that she did not want me to cash these checks so I spoke to a Vice President named Lisa Holland. She said the same thing that everyone in administration did that cashing them should not be a problem. There were very few checks. The vast majority of these checks were very small and there was only one that I got regularly every month and this was under $10.00 The headquarters emailed the Manager about the situation. She sent an email back stating that the only way that the checks would not be cashed was if I did not have enough funds to cover them. A copy was sent to me. The issue of sufficient funds was never raised relating to this situation. The only issue was cashing personal checks against a business account. Was she now denying that this ever happened? In the meantime all the tellers at the local branches were not accepting these checks from customers to cash. Is it possible that she did not want to put it in writing for some reason? Ms Holland then put a notation on my account that I could cash these checks. This concluded this episode.

 I continued to cash the checks until October 6. There were some instances where I had to call the tellers' attention to the notation. On this day the teller said she could not cash them against a business account. I told her to check the notation. She said she was going to ask the same Manager. She said the Manager said that I could not cash it. I then called Lisa Holland who previously put on the notation. I got her secretary and left a message. The Manager Donna called later. She said the way it was left off last time was that I needed to open a personal account to cash checks. I told her that this was not the way it was left off and a notation was put on that I could cash them. She also made statements such as there were government regulations against cashing them. I said I was going to call Ms. Holland. I called and left her a voice mail message. An hour or so later the Manager called me back again and said that she spoke to Ms. Holland. She said they decided to close the Account. This was after Ms. Holland put on the notation the last time that I spoke to her.

I then called the Chairman's help line at the Bank headquarters and spoke to Christine Richmond-Hodges. She seemed concerned and asked if I would be at my number the next morning. She also confirmed seeing Ms. Hollands previous notation on the account at that time. She said that she was going to contact Ms. Holland. to see what was going on. The next day neither Ms. Holland or Ms. Richmond called back. In late afternoon I received a call from Peter Del Bianco. I believe he is the Regional Manager. He was the only one that agreed with the Manager the previous time about the check cashing.. He apparently has a close working relationship with her. He said they were sticking to their position and I could not open an account at any TD Bank. I tried to tell him that there appeared to be a communication problem in that they did not give me any notice since the notation was put on but he cut me off. When I asked if I could say something he said no. I do not know why the other two people who previously attempted to help never called back. He apparently is the person who handles these things. Do they think they are not a part of it if they do not call back? Shortly before Mr. Del Bianco's call I spoke to the Manager of the Medford Branch which is a couple of miles down the road. He said that there was no problem cashing these types of checks. I then went down and cashed the two checks in question totaling about $15.00. (On previous occasions this Branch also refused to cash these checks.)



1. The Account Agreement says that they will cash checks against the account. I think only a regulation would justify them not doing this. I do not think all other banks would be cashing them if there was such a regulation. All the local branch tellers are saying they do not cash them but when you speak to anyone in administration they deny that this is the policy.. Even the Manager in question put in her email that this was not the policy. Is it possible that no one wants to put it in writing? When they put the notation on my account they knew that the Manager was still engaging in the same procedure.

2. I was given no notice about any change of policy as far as the notation that was put on my account before they closed the account. The last thing that happened was that the VP put on the notation that I could cash them. They are now saying that I cannot open an account at any TD Bank I wrote a certified letter to this manager on 10/12 asking why I was not given any notice about a policy change and did not receive an answer. Copies were sent to Ms. Holland and Ms. Richmond who also did not reply.

Lisa Holland responded to the above complaint for TD Bank to The Comptroller of the Currency: She did not even mention the issue of cashing personal checks against a business account.
She stated that the customer was continuously trying to cash checks with insufficient funds in the account to cover the checks. She said I continued to argue the issue with the Manager and she even spoke to me about it. Is this the standard cover story?
My response was:

Dear Sirs:



I recently received the undated reply from TD Bank. Are they saying that the whole thing never happened? Do they not want to admit doing it?



This was not about sufficient funds but that they would not cash this type of check against a business account.. Every teller in this area can verify it as can the customers who were subjected to it. As stated the majority of checks were under ten dollars and there was not a lot of checks. It was not worth doing several transactions for a few dollars. The last incident involved two checks totaling about $15.00. There was about $1000.00 in available funds at the time and they would not cash them. All this is verifiable from account records and phone records. This documents that the incident happened about refusing to cash checks with sufficient funds. I have had accounts for over forty years and know you generally need sufficient funds to cash checks. I have also never run into this. In the last conversation with Del Bianco he said Lisa Howland extended you a courtesy with these checks but they would not continue to do so. He said they would not cash checks against a business account. He also said you do not want to open the appropriate type of account. Ms Holland stated they never allowed me to cash checks against insufficient funds. He said nothing about insufficient funds. This conversation is on my answering machine tape if anyone wants to hear it. I would hope an unresponsive letter would not prevent the appropriate follow up from being taken.

 . . 1. With respect to the question of cashing checks with insufficient funds: Is this their standard cover story? In the 8 years that I had the account I remember about 4 or 5 incidents of asking to cash checks against insufficient funds. In just about every incident they cashed them. There were no arguments about it. Phone records would show that the only time that I spoke to Lisa Holland was in early 2010. This was when she put the notation on the account as verified by her secretarie's voice mail mentioned below. There are no other phone records documenting that she spoke to me .

2. When the Bank first opened I recall that it was the policy to cash checks without sufficient funds to cover them.

3. Why did this happen when I unsuccessfully tried to cash $15,00 in checks with $1000.00 in available funds in the account? This is in the Bank and phone records This shows it was not about insufficient funds . 4. As stated I regularly get only one check under $10.00 and would not have checks to cash against insufficient funds.There would be records of such checks somewhere and there is not. My records would show I get no such checks. It would be an isolated incident. . 5. I found an additional voice mail message from 3/10 in which Ms. Holland's secretary Danielle states that she checked and confirmed that Ms. Holland's notation is on the account and that I should have no trouble cashing checks against the account in the future. This recording is available.



Lisa Holland then replied to my response again saying we declined to cash checks in cases where the customer did not have sufficient funds. She said it was meaningless at this point to debate whether I had sufficient funds on a particular day. If this particular day is when the last incident happened causing them to close the account it shows what this was about. It shows insufficient funds was not the issue. She said they consider the matter closed. She made no mention of the recorded phone conversation. . If they subject the customer to a procedure that they will not admit to, is this a good indication that the customer is justified in protesting it? If they simply said this is our policy that would have been the end of it. If a Bank has officers and managers who just make up anything that they feel like saying, mistreat customers, and then lie to government agencies; how many people would want to do business with this Bank? Would I be justified in thinking that I had good reason to get away from the world's most convenient bank long before this based on what was going on? If customers tried to cash such a check against a business account they could not. But if they call the main office or even the branch they would say no problem and deny the procedure exists.

The Comptroller of The Currency said it does not have judicial power to enforce or interpret private agreements and the customer would need to get an attorney. There was no request to hear the available recordings. These are still available. I assume copies of the case documents could be gotten from the Comptroller of the Currency. I did not see this as a contract dispute but a question of how this Bank treats customers , if they lie to government. agencies.and if they subject customers to an abusive procedure that they will not admit to and then lie about it.