Electronic check conversion and angry customers
by John Burnett and Ken Golliher, BOL Gurus Guru BIOS
Question: What are other banks telling their customers about electronic check conversion? There has been no mention of it in the media and customers are coming back to us angry that "we" are destroying their checks and it is "our" fault. We have no idea what the vendors (American Express; Wal-Mart, etc.) are doing with their copies/images of the checks and customers are expecting us to know. Have standards been issued for the vendors as to how long or what they have to do with the check before it is electronified?
Answer by John Burnett: The ACH rules require that the original items be held for 14 days, and then destroyed. There must be a way to retrieve a copy.
Although there has been no "press" about conversions, there certainly has been enough opportunity for banks to get out in front of this situation and enlighten their customers. If they're blaming you, it's because they don't understand that you aren't doing this, and are not in control of who can do it, or to whom. And that's because many banks haven't yet done the customer education piece.
The Fed puts out a pretty decent pamphlet explaining check conversions. You can view its contents at Check Conversions. Or you can download a PDF version from that same page, take it to your printer and put your bank's name and logo in the handly little box they reserved for you, and do a mailing.
Answer by Ken Golliher: My sympathies are entirely with the consumer on this issue. However, it is the industry's piecemeal adoption of technology and merchants' failure to follow the rules that are the culprits, not individual financial institutions. The vast majority of bankers do not understand the mechanisms under which checks can and cannot be converted to electronic entries.
Here's a link to consumer pamphlets sold by NACHA on point of purchase and lock box check conversions. (Please note, the one John recommended is free and, just guessing, more likely to include references to a complaint process.)
When the Check Truncation Act becomes law the wave of consumer criticism will be a tsunami. Who cares, right? It's only their money.
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