Third Party Access to Bank Accounts

Noble101

I am disputing third party access being granted to my dads account. Bank says that because access was granted over 6 years ago they do not have copy of the agreement. Can they use this as a defence? Even though they have no legal reason to hold on to anything over 6 years surely they retain important things such as agreements of this nature for a little longer? Any knowledge on these matters gratefully received. 

eskbanker

If they say they don't have it then it's academic whether or not anyone thinks they should have it, but has a Subject Access Request been used to formalise a request about what they hold?

jonesMUFCforever

OP - who has been granted third party access and which bank?
Does dad not know ?
The actual physical form may be long gone but I would have thought that a bank would know from its records who was granted access and a signature to check authority etc.

Noble101

eskbanker said:

If they say they don't have it then it's academic whether or not anyone thinks they should have it, but has a Subject Access Request been used to formalise a request about what they hold?

Hi yes we have done one of those. He received it yesterday, I have not had sight of it yet but I will at the weekend. I don't actually know whether anyone has looked for it they just assume that procedures were followed in line with what was required at the time it was granted back in 2012.

Noble101

jonesMUFCforever said:

OP - who has been granted third party access and which bank?
Does dad not know ?
The actual physical form may be long gone but I would have thought that a bank would know from its records who was granted access and a signature to check authority etc.

The access was granted to my mum. Dad did not know about it at all no reason for access to his sole account. We have been through the bank complaints procedure and they say all relevant checks were carried out even though they gave me two procedures that could have been used but could not tell me which one was used. I have requested all the notes from his account, Dad has got them but I have not seen them yet. I am just interested in whether it is industry standard to retain copies of these types of agreement above the Data protection act recommended 6 years, if there is a dispute I am not sure how they have a defence if they can't produce the original agreement.

jonesMUFCforever

So has Mum spent Dad's money - is there mental health issues with your Dad?

colsten

Noble101 said:

 I am just interested in whether it is industry standard to retain copies of these types of agreement above the Data protection act recommended 6 years, if there is a dispute I am not sure how they have a defence if they can't produce the original agreement.

I don't think there is a blanket 6 year recommendation. I would expect that a bank would have a retention policy that keeps things like 3rd party access agreements for as long as such access exists.

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-data-protection/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/principles/storage-limitation/

Even the FCA only gives guidance, not absolute timescales for different data: 



https://www.handbook.fca.org.uk/handbook/SYSC/9/1.html

jonnygee2

I am just interested in whether it is industry standard to retain copies of these types of agreement above the Data protection act recommended 6 years, if there is a dispute I am not sure how they have a defence if they can't produce the original agreement.

I think you could certainly escalate this complaint to FOS with some chance of success.

As the access is still granted, the documents should have been kept. GDPR doesn't say you need to delete absolutely everything after 6 years. Actually it doesn't even mention 6 years. If they have actually just blanket deleted all records from over 6 years ago, they could end up in a lot of disputes like this.

I'm not actually clear who has to prove what here, I haven't seen any FOS cases around deleted agreements. If you do escalate it, please give us the FOS complaint number, I'd be very interested in how this one turns out.

AnotherJoe

If your aim is a complaint, make one.

If its to stop access, can dad just not move banks? Maybe even keep the account open as a shell with nothing going on?

jonesMUFCforever

There is something going on here which the OP does not want to divulge.
I do find it difficult to believe that a bank would simply add a third party access to someone without the authority of the customer. This is normally done in a branch with both parties present.
Electronic notes would have been taken (which the OP seems to have requested copies) and the physical paper form would have been filed. This filed copy may be in the branch that it was  signed in - but who knows if that branch is still open or whether the correspondence has been sent to a central location to be stored (and destroyed as per Data Protection laws).

I wonder if she thinks mum has fraudulently taken money from dad's account?

Noble101

jonesMUFCforever said:

So has Mum spent Dad's money - is there mental health issues with your Dad?

No issues with dad. We discovered all this once mum passed away a year ago.