Can anyone tell me if they ever opened a savings account with a charitable organization listed as a beneficiary. My only concern without ever doing this is that a charitable organization is a business account and would appear that it should be opened as a business account and not an individual or joint account.

Thanks for any response as banks are always willing to open new accounts but are always responsible to ensure they are in compliance with all banking regulations.

Yes, it is possible to open a savings account with a charitible organization as the beneficiary. We run into this all the time, especially with CD's. Many older customers designated a church, etc. as a pay on death beneficiary. The customer will not get any additional FDIC insurance through the POD category, however. After the customer's death, the funds are simply payable to the charitable organization. The organization has no claim to the funds until the customer's death. At that time you will close the account (after receiving proper documentation) and issue a check to the charity. Since the charity doesn't own the funds until the customer dies, there is no need for it to be currently in a business account.

I suggest you look at your state's Multiple Party Account statute or whatever law talks about survivorship provisions on bank accounts. The answer often turns on what how a "person" is defined there; i.e. does it include entities or just people? Not verifying that it is acceptable could mean that a judge would set the transfer aside at your customer's death.