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Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

nytimes.com

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Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#491

Post by runeks »

krupan wrote: post #70

The crazy thing to me in all this is that the types and amounts of transactions you make with your money and the bank is not criminal and never could be. It could however be a technique used to hide things that are criminal like fraud or theft. Somehow somewhere along the way we as a society decided we were ok with criminalizing the types of transactions that can be used to hide crime. That to me should have been a c…

> Somehow somewhere along the way we as a society decided we were ok with criminalizing the types of transactions that can be used to hide crime.

It’s not criminalized. If it were, you’d go to jail instead of just having your account closed.

The real problem is that politicians made banks liable if an account is used for laundering, so naturally banks terminate accounts that look suspicious in order to avoid getting fined.

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#492

Post by altfredd »

bruce511 wrote: post #384
BLKNSLVR wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that the likes of Google, Meta, and Amazon are normalising (have normalised?) "scale via automation" and are making bank on an unprecedented scale as a result. If they can do it, so can we. Just like offshoring manufacturing and service centres to places that pay the lowest wages (even though us proles aren't allowed to buy entertainment media from those same places, but that's a separate topic) Race y…

Google, meta and Amazon all have good customer service. In the case of Google and Meta though don't confuse Customer with User. User service is not a thing. Clearly this thread -is- about Customer (not User) Service, so I'm not suggesting that banks are the same. Financial systems have a bot / scam / fraud problem. As others have pointed out, that is the cause of most of the human pain in that space.

Must be nice when your sole customers are nation-states and 3-letter agencies. Better B2B than B2B (or should it be called something else... N2B — nation-to-business?)

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#493

Post by ajhurliman »

JCharante wrote: post #342
shiroiuma wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>use services like wise.com for transfers Last I heard, wise.com is outright stealing people's money now. Otherwise, this is a good heads-up. Banking for expats can be tricky; a lot of US financial institutions don't want to service customers who live overseas, and will automatically cancel your account if they find out you don't live in the US. The US is looking more and more like the old Soviet Union, where people…

Really? Wise has been reliable for a long time and they've improved the partners they work with in the last year to get much faster transfer times. I've sent around 15-20k usd with wise

Wise was reliable and cheap up until October when they cancelled all the business debit cards and changed all business account/ routing numbers, both with a 2 day heads up. There’s no way to pay any of the bills that require debit/credit cards, so I just had to get a brick and mortar account. Wise said they’re “working hard” on getting to issuing new debit cards, but can’t give any sort of timeline.

I’ve moved the majority of my money out since it feels like they might fold soon, there’s just a lot of things on autopay with that account so it’s kind of a hassle to move everything off.

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#494

Post by ArabicBaklava »

ArabicBaklava wrote: post #481

Bank of america did this to me, in the same weekend i was moving out. All my stuff was in the car, it was a friday at 3PM and i was in the gas station. I couldn't fill up my gas. Called and they told me to come to the bank with two forms of ID. When I arrived to the bank the fraud department was operating in NY (3hrs ahead) and they were closing, so they told me to come next tuesday (it was a long weekend). I went ho…

Well, this happened in 2017.. fast forward to this account closure effect on my life:

I had to go back to my country, without a degree, was not able to land any job. Unfortunately, good places require degrees. Stayed unemployed, hit with chronic depression as anyone would. Lost 4+ years of professional progress. When covid came, i was able to complete my degree online and graduated in 2021, but because all fresh grad programs require a certain age; i did not qualify. Was able to finally land a good job in 2023.

This issue needs a resolution, what happened to me might not happen to everyone, i know my situation is different. but financial institutions should be held responsible for actions like this, imagine someone else who needs to pay for his/her medication...

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#495

Post by TheCapeGreek »

Tao3300 wrote: post #317
catlover76 wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

huh?

As a rule of thumb, people calling crypto a "space" are trying to hustle you.

huh?

I'm no crypto fanatic, but I call plenty of things a "space". It's basically a synonym for niche?

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#496

Post by landemva »

eru wrote: post #399
hwillis wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

banking does sometimes require actual money still, much more so if you're poorer. What's another institution that has offices everywhere , ships things every day, and privately and securely stores things for huge numbers of customers? Remember, DMVs/RMVs are state-level. Hell, they're even surprisingly used to keeping large amounts of valuable paper safe. It wasn't that long ago that you could make a lot of money ste…

> What's another institution that has offices everywhere, ships things every day, [...] Walmart or 7-11 or so? Jokes aside, giving banking licenses to retailers might be a sensible thing to do. (Or removing the whole system of banks requiring licenses altogether would be even better.)

Walmart does have banking.

https://www.consumerreports.org/banks/is-banking-at-walmart-...

"At its more than 4,600 in-store MoneyCenters, as well as online, millions of customers have access to basic, low-cost banking services, including the ability to withdraw cash, make deposits, and pay bills."

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#497

Post by pauldenton »

panarky wrote: post #149
raincom wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in the UK, NatWest debanked Neil Farage's account for his political views. Even its CEO resigned over her lying. "19 Republican states accuse JPMorgan of closing bank accounts and discriminating against customers due to their religious or political beliefs" [1][3]. Of course, this site is not favorable to conservatives and their views. Some left activists' accounts are closed as well [2]. [1] https://www.bus…

The fact that someone with a political opinion had their account closed is not evidence that Chase is monitoring all their customers' political activity and systematically closing accounts for political activity Chase doesn't like. The same way that Chase closing a restaurant's account is not evidence that Chase is tasting the food in every restaurant and systematically closing accounts for restaurants that cook food…

So what alternative theory do you have for all those accounts being closed?

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#499

Post by pauldenton »

maccard wrote: post #373
raincom wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in the UK, NatWest debanked Neil Farage's account for his political views. Even its CEO resigned over her lying. "19 Republican states accuse JPMorgan of closing bank accounts and discriminating against customers due to their religious or political beliefs" [1][3]. Of course, this site is not favorable to conservatives and their views. Some left activists' accounts are closed as well [2]. [1] https://www.bus…

> At least in the UK, NatWest debanked Neil Farage's account for his political views. Even its CEO resigned over her lying. No, a subsidiary of NatWest closed Farage's account when he no longer met the investment thresholds for the account he held. The CEO resigned for telling a journalist the above. That's not the same thing, at all.

They resigned for telling a journalist that because it was a lie. https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/britains-bbc-... Britain's BBC has apologised to Nigel Farage over a story it ran on the closure of his accounts at NatWest's (NWG.L) private bank Coutts, which the former Brexit Party leader had said was the result of his political views.

The BBC had previously reported Farage falling below the financial threshold required to be a customer at Coutts - whose website advises its clients should be able to borrow or invest at least 1 million pounds ($1.28 million) with the bank or hold 3 million pounds in savings - was the reason for the closure.But an internal review of the bank account obtained by Farage showed the private bank's wealth reputational risk committee had said his values did not align with the bank's own.

"We acknowledge that the information we reported - that Coutts' decision on Mr Farage's account did not involve considerations about his political views - turned out not to be accurate and have apologised to Mr Farage," the BBC said in the corrections and clarifications section of its website.

Re: Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts

#500

Post by TheCapeGreek »

JCharante wrote: post #342
shiroiuma wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>use services like wise.com for transfers Last I heard, wise.com is outright stealing people's money now. Otherwise, this is a good heads-up. Banking for expats can be tricky; a lot of US financial institutions don't want to service customers who live overseas, and will automatically cancel your account if they find out you don't live in the US. The US is looking more and more like the old Soviet Union, where people…

Really? Wise has been reliable for a long time and they've improved the partners they work with in the last year to get much faster transfer times. I've sent around 15-20k usd with wise

Sending money through them still seems to be OK, mostly. But holding funds -and similarly to the Chase stories in this post- seems to be risky business, if you don't fit a cookie cutter model of a business (for whatever Wise's definition of that is). Ironically if you're using Wise, you probably aren't a cookie cutter business in the first place, so I don't know what's going on with them.

Anecdotally it definitely also seems to be related if you deal with the third world much, as the linked OP below and myself are. Luckily the worst I've come across is arbitrary extra KYC popping up exactly as I'm needing to do time-sensitive transfers.

Good thread on recent events: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38069117

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