Hi all. We had a signer on a business account refuse to give us his mother's maiden name during account opening. I know it's not required under the CIP, and he's technically not the "customer" under the CIP, but we have both in our policy. Do you think his refusal to provide this information is SAR worthy? It was certainly strange how he made a big deal about it and refused to provide it.

What crime do you suspect of being committed? It sounds like you have an identification requirement that this person felt was excessive and they let you know their feelings about it.

I've never seen that required for CIP before. Maybe he uses that name for all his passwords and that's why he was upset at providing it. But if its in your policy....

So why is that required? For call-in verification purposes? Never heard of that one before. If it is the only allowed security question, maybe add choices ?

I have to agree with Brian. Requesting a mothers maiden name is done at the banks discretion. If your policy is too restrictive, you may want to revise your CIP to allow for this to be more of an optional item than a requirement.

I'm not sure what category you would check if you were going to file the SAR.

If this is in your CIP policy, consider removing it and placing within procedures, so management has more options to waive when circumstances dictate.

What if they were an orphan?

or had 2 father figures
or had 2 mother figures (which one would they provide)
times are a-changing

Only one woman gives birth to you and "unknown" could be an option ? Just trying to think outside the box.....

It is a bad choice anyway and I am not sure why anyone would dare to use that piece of information anymore. Give me five minutes on the internet and 10 minutes on ancestry.com and I bet I could tell you 50% of people's mother maiden name. If you are using that for any type of security purposes, I think that needs some serious reconsideration.