To think banks shouldn't do this

[Northernsoulgirl45]

We have had a joint account with our bank for almost 20 years. We have always paid a good salary in and have never been overdrawn.
So two weeks ago we paid a cheque into our account for circa 15K.which was settlement for an insurance claim. This was subsequently debited as an unpaid cheque. Cue lots of stress trying to find out the reason why.
So we finally received a letter telling us that the transaction was subjuct to a security check and we must provide id and proof of the transaction.
Apparently they would than decide whether our account should remain open.
They also stopped the account so a new direct debit we set up was rejected causing embarrassment.
Of course we complained but we were told that they were within their rights to do this. I assume this is to do with money laundering regulation but it still seems heavy handed
AIBU to think this ?

It does seem heavy handed. Which bank was it?

Did you pay it over the counter? If so the cashier should have mentioned this could happen

Read the money section of any newspaper and you'll see they all do this. It's appalling. As far as I can tell Barclays, NatWest and HSBC are the worst.

I agree they shouldn't stop your transactions. Fine for them to have a bit of time to check that the cheque is genuine before allowing the money to show in your account, but they're a bank, you'd think it would be their job to check with the other bank that nothing isn't amiss, rather than put the onus on you. It seems very over the top, if they were going to be odd about it, why did they accept the cheque in the fist place? Even an automated machine could flag up that that amount of money needs to be checked.

You randomly got a large sum of cash deposited into your account. It would be wrong of them not to investigate this 🤷‍♀️

The anti money laundering regs are extremely stringent and the bank would rather risk pissing you off than attract a large fine from the FCA.

It's not random though - if it was an insurance settlement, & a cheque, they can easily trace it - it's not like a large wad of cash.

Yes investigate it for sure. Maybe look at where the chque has come from and think yes one would maybe expect that organisations to be issuing cheques that size and giving us a ring to clarify it. Nit stopping the account without timely advice.

The company issuing the cheque was as shocked as we were. They said as far as there are aware this has never happened before.

We have a secondary account for all incidental income because of this, dh has money coming from abroad sometimes so I don't like to risk the pain account

O dear optical we were going to move to NatWest. Maybe not than

Change to First Direct.
They would have rung you to check before causing an issue.

They should provide a way for it to be authorised first so that this doesn't happen.

The banks that are the worst for this are the ones that have in the past received big fines for not catching money laundering and/or being in breach of dealing with money/ transactions from sanctioned countries. They have been forced to tighten up security checks around any unusual large transactions.

So for example
Barclays: Money Laundering- www.fca.org.uk/news/press-releases/fca-fines-barclays-£72-million-poor-handling-financial-crime-risks
Breaking US Sanctions- www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/business/2010/aug/16/barclays-fined-for-sanction-breaking

HSBC: Money Laundering -www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/12/11/hsbc-spared-us-money-laundering-sanctions-battles-clean-act/amp/

RBS/NatWest: www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/business/2010/aug/03/royal-bank-of-scotland-fsa-biggest-fine

Also this: www.fca.org.uk/news/press-releases/fca-fines-rbs-natwest-and-ulster-bank-ltd-£42-million-it-failures

I'm a lawyer dealing with civil claims so regularly send cheques like that out. It's not unusual to for me to receive calls from banks/building societies wanting to check that all is bona fide.

I agree this appears to be heavy handed and a slightly over eager reading of the money laundering regulations. However under the regulations it is a criminal offence for the bank to “tip off” someone they suspect may be money laundering. Unfortunately asking “where does the money come from” etc could be seen as tipping off if the cheque had raised suspicions. This will be why the bank did not contact you. As someone mentioned the penalties are severe and common sense does not always get applied due to the fear of the penalties. Although I am surprised a payment coming from an insurance firm triggered suspicions if it was one of the large ones. However money launderers are extremely inventive in the ways they move money.

Cat is right. They can't question you, they have to comply with very stringent regulations. It's a really poor experience for you but any bank would have had to go through the same process, sadly.

Surely any twit working for a bank could put two and two together and clearly see that a cheque from an insurance company is legitimate.

I'd be livid if this happened to me.

Thst makes mord sense but a call ro rhe insurance company could have resolved it. Hey ho.

Plus someone with an account held for 20 years with a regular salary of nearly 4k pm going it is not exactly a prime contenter for money laundering.

My husband is an accountant. This is very standard nowadays due to anti money laundering regulations. It happens all the time. It won't make a difference what bank you are with. €15,000 Is the amount which will trigger an investigation typically it should be because of a cash deposit to you Would be within your rights to question why a cheque from a named company caused suspicion.

As I recall any deposit over £10k gets reported for anti-money laundering.

Money laundering doesn't require you to be a career criminal overseeing a vast empire.

It's a criminal offence to watch live TV without a TV licence. So if you were to do that, then the extra money you had by virtue of not paying for a licence is proceeds of a crime... And what you do with that money becomes a money laundering issue.

An anti-money laundering report could therefore be made about you by your bank or whoever (e.g. If you announced that's why you had the extra cash you were paying in!).

I thought it was any transaction over £10,000 in cash that needed to be looked at, not cheque payments from insurance companies and solicitors etc.
We live and learn.

Anyone could be involved in money laundering, your salary and length of time with the bank don't exclude you from suspicion. Most people have held a bank account all their adult life and most people have a salary coming in, it's nothing special

I remember years ago my DH and I got a loan from our bank for £7000 to consolidate some debts and pay for something (I can't remember what now).

So they pay the money into our account and shock horror - we start spending it! And then I'm stood in m&s and my card is declined and I had to ring them. There has been unusual spending in your account pinkprincess so we wanted to check it was ok! 😂

In the case of op I can understand them holding off clearing then check while they investigate but to halt the account and not pay a dd isn't unfair.