can a bank refuse to give you your own money?

lollymary

after selling his house my partner wanted to move the substantial amount of money from his current account in the Nat.West and after searching around took the advice of the Santander to deposit it in their instant access branch saver account. We didn't know how long it would take us to find a property and told them so. After a month we found a property, had our offer accepted and wanted to put all our monies in one account back at the Nat.West ready to pay cash for the property. yesterday we went to get our money in cheque or transfer from the Santander and they wouldn't give it to us!!!!It took four hours of wrangling to eventually get a cheque.
They insisted that we had to prove to them where the money came from (which they should have had in their own record of transaction with the Nat.West) or prove to them what the money was to be used for. The alternative was that they would only release the money direc to our solicitor for the house transaction. We were flabbergasted and extremely annoyed. Is this legal????Having already jumped through all the hoops of providing evidence of identity surely they have no right to withold our money or demand to know what we are planning to do with it.??
Anyone???

kazwookie

If it is over £10K then money laundering laws come in to force.

DVardysShadow

kazwookie wrote: »

If it is over £10K then money laundering laws come in to force.

They should have asked the questions before accepting the money. Asking when someone wants to take it out is outrageous.

martindow

kazwookie wrote: »

If it is over £10K then money laundering laws come in to force.

But shouldn't Santander have checked the provenance when they received the money rather than when it is paid out?
Edit:Beaten to it by DVS

clutton_2

what you plan to spend your money on is NO ONE elses business

bandofbrothers

They wanted to hang onto your investment money !!

Catatonia

That is crazy. Definitely complain to Santander. I complained about the fact it took several phone calls, two letters and four branch visits for them to change the address on my ISA and they sent me £25.

zaksmum

When I wanted to take money from a Barclays Instant Access account I had a load of hassle too.

They told me to wait, then escorted me upstairs to a "private" area. I was told to wait again, and stressed I did not want to see a financial adviser as I had immediate plans for the money.

Got taken into a side office then where another man shook hands with me and explained he was a financial adviser!!

By this time I'd been in the bank for nearly an hour and I was fuming!

I complained and they sent me flowers, but how ridiculous is that?

No wonder the OPs mad...four hours to get a cheque????

DVardysShadow

zaksmum wrote: »

When I wanted to take money from a Barclays Instant Access account I had a load of hassle too.

They told me to wait, then escorted me upstairs to a "private" area. I was told to wait again, and stressed I did not want to see a financial adviser as I had immediate plans for the money.

Got taken into a side office then where another man shook hands with me and explained he was a financial adviser!!

By this time I'd been in the bank for nearly an hour and I was fuming!

I complained and they sent me flowers, but how ridiculous is that?

No wonder the OPs mad...four hours to get a cheque????

Flowers for that is so cliched, it is almost insulting.

I have had similar, but putting money into a current account, which I had transferred from a building society. I was told that we needed to be questioned 'for money laundering'. Taken into a back room, which had barred windows, making Mrs Shadow and myself feel even more threatened - and after a cursory provenance question, proceeded to try and sell us a financial product - for a few seconds. How barmy is that? Your bank winds you up by using the money laundering thing and then tries to sell you a product when you are fuming about having to submit to the nuLabour Stasi questioning over your own money -and the use of this as a crass pretext to sell you a product.

It was Lloyds by the way. And the last straw in a banking relationship which had lasted 30 years.

G_M

Look up their complaints procedure and complain in writing.

Cost your 4 hours at.... £25 per hour? £50?

And ad on £50 for distress, stress and aggrevation.

The time to do money laundraing checks is when you produce the money, not when you try to spend it.

zaksmum

DVardysShadow wrote: »

Flowers for that is so cliched, it is almost insulting.

I have had similar, but putting money into a current account, which I had transferred from a building society. I was told that we needed to be questioned 'for money laundering'. Taken into a back room, which had barred windows, making Mrs Shadow and myself feel even more threatened - and after a cursory provenance question, proceeded to try and sell us a financial product - for a few seconds. How barmy is that? Your bank winds you up by using the money laundering thing and then tries to sell you a product when you are fuming about having to submit to the nuLabour Stasi questioning over your own money -and the use of this as a crass pretext to sell you a product.

It was Lloyds by the way. And the last straw in a banking relationship which had lasted 30 years.

When I was opening an account with Bradford & Bingley I had to wait in an office while the person dealing with me trotted off to photocopy my passport as a form of ID.

Sitting on the desk while I waited was a form headed SUSPICIOUS ACCOUNT ACTIVITY with the full name, address and date of birth of an elderly man.

The form stated this man had asked to open an account with 12K in cash.

Then it said staff had asked him where the money came from and written underneath it said "kept at home for many years in box under the stairs".

The address given was just a few streets away from my house and I was horrified that this poor man's financial details were left for me or anyone else to see.

When the woman returned with my passport I pointed out this form and she said, oh, sorry about that!

Yet there's a drug dealer around here who's never worked a day in his life, but has 4 top of the range cars and a girlfriend who's just had a boob job.

Why don't the authorities grill them like they do the rest of us???