Kafkaesque Banking

unionworkeruk

A month ago I tried to pay £4,000 into my Co-op bank account. Several years of general savings and booking travel tickets for friends who dont speak much English and cannot use the internet.  I am 77 and was with a younger friend of 50 and his son of 20. After being asked where the money was from, my telephone password, passport and driving licence, I have neither, the cashier refused to take the deposit. I then went to the HSBC who took it without question.

Last Thursday, a month later, I had a visit from the police who questioned me, somewhat lighheartedly  about the source of the money and my friends who had driven me to the bank. They implied that the cashier believed I might be being forced to deposit money in my account ! They advised me to contact my bank which I then found had blocked my account.  I phoned them and after an hour was told they would ring me Friday. I did and was told they would contact me later which they didnt.

I phoned the fraud department on Saturday  who could or would not tell me what was being investigated, how long it would take and why they did not contact me if they had any suspicions of what I assume would be illegal activity. I have £1000 in the bank and use to for the occasional purchases or to send small amounts - £20 - £50 for friends to their relatives in Poland.

I now have a blocked account, a visit from police in uniform, being investigated by th Coop Bank fraud department  who wont speak to me, tell me what they are looking for, how loing it will take or what I should  do for money in the meantime. All because I wanted to put my savings in the  bank and friends were good enough to drive me there.  A somewhat  Kafkaesque situation over which I have no control or imput  

Is this normal because I have never experienced it in 50 years of banking with HSBC  and what can I do to speed it up and get acess to my money  ?

Bridlington1

By the sounds of things Co-op has reported the account to the national crime agency and as such it can't give you any explanation as it risks "tipping off" the account holder which is a criminal offence.

All you can do is co-operate with the fraud department and police as best as you can and wait it out. There's little if anything you can do to speed things up as the matter is out of your hands. It will take as long as it takes I'm afraid. It could take a day, it could take a week, it could take months, who knows?

As for what you should do now I would say get any payments that were due to be paid into Co-op redirected to your HSBC account ASAP, consider opening an account elsewhere as a backup in case HSBC gets frozen and in future ensure you have savings spread out across multiple baking institutions so that if one account gets frozen you still have accessible savings to fall back on.

Voyager2002

Yes this is normal. An unusually large cash deposit is going to make the cashier suspicious, and then the first thing that happens is the account is frozen while the fraud team investigate. By law, they cannot communicate with you until their investigation is complete.

It is a matter of chance that the Co-op cashier was suspicious while the HSBC one was not.

dealyboy

Hi @unionworkeruk ...

We live in a different age and in a different country from when I was young.

People then had judgement, they could call upon more experienced people to deal with the matter there and then, with a satisfactory outcome. Then, the worst that would have happened is that you would have been politely asked for some written evidence, however the best that would have happened is that you would have been welcomed by your bank manager as a long standing customer of good standing, and they would make the deposit for you.