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  • Report:  #226263

Complaint Review: UBS AG (Bank) - Zurich

Reported By:
- Payson, Arizona,
Submitted:
Updated:

UBS AG (Bank)
UBS AG, Barengasse 16, Postfach, 8098 Zurich, 8098 Syrian Arab Republic
Phone:
011-411-237-2996
Web:
N/A
Categories:
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UBS "You & Us" Broken Trust, Breaks WW II AF Widow

The large display ads appearing weekly in the Wall Street Journal, by the New York City Office of World Wide UBS Ag Bank, are quite inviting..."At UBS, we know managing wealth means responding to changes in the market, the world and your life...we consider the perfect time to assess where you are headed as an ongoing conversation called, "You & Us."

My 91 year old friend and elderly patient, Lester Wilken, of Laguna Woods, CA, trusted UBS to manage all his wealth in the Zurich Bank for one reason and one reason only. The peace loving ole timer I helped was so blinded with Macular Degeneration he depended on the eyes of UBS executive director,

Claude Ulmann, from Zurich, to manage his accumulated wealth so all heirs named, received his inheritance gifts tax free to prevent any of his earned income from being used to finance a US war...

My relationshiop with Wilken began with his plea to save his California condo from unjust liens filed by an unethical contractor's cost over run in a roofing dispute.

Wilken's HOA board of directors had exhausted the maintenance and reserve funds so much, the corp. board had no funds for legal help. He requested my editor with Freedom Newspapers arrange an appointment for me to help him, due to his confidence in my consumer column, " Money Doctor."

Two weeks after I filed a documented claim with the office of the State Contractor's License Board, we both celebrated the good word, the dispute was settled by their office, no legal action, lien or loss of equity.

When Wilken learned my volunteer assistance was quite time consuming and costly with my small WW II Death Benefit pension, he asked UBS for an appointment to fly me to the Zurich Bank to open a $250,000 trust fund for my future work helping others as I had helped him.

His Zurich manager, Claude E. Ulmann, informed him, "It is better for me to fly a UBS Power of Attorney to your home in CA to arrange the trust for you rather than a man of your years having to cross the ocean to our Zurich Bank...because I am flying to Los Angeles, CA in the month of May with a Power of Attorney and it will be easy for me to make the 45 mile trip to your condo."

Wilken was so elated he phoned my daughter, Diane Morrison and I to invite us to meet with UBS Director Claude Ulmann in his CA condo on May 22, 1999 to join him in signing the UBS Power of Attorney in person.

Wilken's nephew called us the morning of March 1, 2,004 to report his uncle, had died the morning of Feb 26, 2004 and he furnished us the address of Claude Ulmann so we could request he transfer the $250,000 trust fund he assured Wilken was in place in our name.

As the weeks went by without a reponse or fund, I contacted the UBS Staff in Zurich for the most sickening shock possible, "Ulmann did not establish a trust fund as he told Lester Wilken, no papers were found in his office file with our name or any evidence of the Power of Attorney, which the Bank knew nothing about and Ulmann refused to explain or respond to our requests for transfer of our trust fund.

While this claim was being ignored I was further alarmed by a Pulitizer Prize winning article in the St. Pete Times Paper which revealed over half of all Florida Senior Citizens were left living in poverty because of broken bank trusts in Florida Banks.

The second shock in that award winning series was the revelation, the most dangerous link to the stolen trust funds was each senior signed a Power of Attorney because a POA is a license to steal in the hands of a bank official without ethics.

The UBS Law firm in Zurich then informed me they would not honor my UBS Power of Attorney even though Claude E. Ulmann was still employed as one of their executive directors in wealth management, because he violated the bank requirement a power of attorney was not valid without the signature and stamp of the wealth manager who drew up the instrument.

One the date of the POA signing, Ulmann had informed us the only signature needed was ours...and all he wrote on the block for his signature was the word, Zurich, indicating the trust was held in the Zurich home office bank.

How would we three trusting American seniors know the rules of law in a Zurich Bank...or suspect a man Wilken trusted with his large fortune so many years was taking advantage of his near death and our bank ignorance to put himself in position of our funds far away from his bank associates knowledge?

The US Bank Comptroller's Office in Houston, Texas has a copy of the May 22, 1999 Power of Attorney, the hand written letter Lester Wilken wrote us to celebrate the fact Ulmann's long distance phone call from Zurich assured him our trust fund was in place drawing interest and on the demise of Wilken he would arrange the transfer we wanted to our American Bank Account with Bank of America, in California.

As the weeks went by I became uneasy Ulmann not ony failed to send papers for the trust transfer, he never provided us with the account number or interest earned or mailed a bank statement showing the balance.

This week's copy of the Wall Street Journal contains a complete advertising section of UBS wealth management and investment opportunities for unwary American investors.

My contacts with the Wall Street Journal Editor have not brought any response or the New York City Attorney General's Office who called the theft of our trust fund a civil matter.

The Comptroller of the Currency, Adminstrator of National Banks, Houston, Texas, simply informed us my case was assigned the case # 586634 on Sept. 21, 2005, by Customer Assistance Group, but no assistance has been forth coming.

So the result is, I Willowdean Vance, an aging military widow now face loss of medical care not provided by the Veterans Administration which never paid me the pension past due for my the WW II service that claimed the life of my patriotic husband, USAF M/Sgt Rudy L. Vance, on Sept. 4, 1979, as result of VA failure to properlty treat him for Malaria and TB of the bone contractred in India with the 101st Supply Unit.

As a military widow deprived of the military widow's full benefits, mother of two overlooked Vietnam Vets, and victim of such a famous, wealthy bank trusted world wide for wealth management, I feel we should award UBS a First Place Rip Off Award, for rippng off an old soldier's wife to deny me much needed medical care for circulation problems.

I have considered fund raising to print some bumper stickers for auto ads which read, "Don't bank on banks" because the US Congress has no plans for bank reform and you cannot count on any help from a state attorney general on bank reform, the bank lobbyists are too generous.

Considering the high cost of Medicare, etc. from stress induced illness of seniors, my big question is why Congress has refused a hearing on bank rip offs.

The sad truth is, I, was not only robbed of a trust fund with UBS, I am also the victim of a bank fraud with Barnett Bank, Sebring, Florida in the estate of Sebring Senior, Arnott Harry Armstrong, who sent me a letter he paid Barnett Bank Manager to deliver a check made out to me with title to his 1976 Ford I helped him buy on his death in appreciation of my help to him following his accident when I helped him buy the car to transport him to his doctor, etc.

I have a picture of Harry standing by the car he called the "Little green hornet" he loved so much, but no one knows who is driving the little car he dreamed would gve me so much pleasure, and I weep when I read his last letter to tell me, "Please use the check from me to buy yourself something you never felt you could afford in appreciation of all you did for me."

Those last, warm words, "please buy yourself something you never felt you could afford, "also cover the intent of dear friend, Lester Wilken, because his number one concern was that I was the only associate he knew willing to spend my time and limited funds to save a senior's American Dream, and his trust fund was his way to make sure I didn't spend so much effort helping others, I lost the roof over my head.

The moral of this rip off is seniors may have longer life today than any generation, but we are subject to so many cruel rip-offs we can't even bank on banks and not one of the state or federal consumer agencies have any interest in bank rip offs as long as congress approves their high earning funds and benefits.

I close with the warning of Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, "if at any time the Republic we have given you no longer works, it is your DUTY to reform it." My fellow country men, we can no longer bank on banks or the officials paid to audit them, the system does not work, so drag out your pens and phones and let our Congressmen know, if they want to count on our future campaign contributions to be elected the Ways and Means Committee better conduct a hearing on Bank reform so we can bank on banks.

Willowdean

Payson, Arizona
U.S.A.


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