Our attorneys have informed us that there has been a change in the way some estate accounts will be used in the near future. The new type will be opened as a savings account and will only be opened long enough for any Reg CC deposit hold to be removed, then the account will be closed and the funds will be dispersed to the beneficiaries. We would not be creating a new savings type as far as the account number or the account features. The account would be opened like any other statement savings account we would open for a consumer. We would like to be able to charge a one-time fee on these accounts at account opening. Would this be a violation since we are offering the same product but charging a fee due to the ownership?

We currently charge of $3.00 fee for the closeout of an account that has been opened for less than 90 days, but we would like to charge a fee of $40 to $50 on the new estate savings.

We will still have some of the long term estate checking accounts that we will not make any changes to or charge any additional fees.

will only be opened long enough for any Reg CC deposit hold to be removed

What Regulation CC hold on a savings account, unless your State law extends Regulation CC to those account types?

I don't see why that you could not create a specific account type for these transactions and charge them whatever you want .

How are they going to distribute funds from a savings account to each beneficiary anyway??

Is this really an issue mandated by State law?

I misspoke regarding the Reg CC hold. I should have stated it as a hold on the funds.
Creating a new account type thru our core processor takes time and expense we were hoping to avoid.
Funds would be distributed by the executor coming into our office and requesting check withdrawals.

I guess the basic questions is, can we charge a fee on a savings account based on the ownership?

Whether you can impose a fee is a matter of state law. You would have to disclose it, even if that means you would have to add this fee to those already being disclosed for your other savings accounts. That could be done with an addendum to the disclosures, as long as it's delivered with the rest of the account disclosures for the account.

I can't find a way to exclude these accounts from the coverage of Regulation DD.

John, if these are truly estate accounts, they wouldn't be considered consumer accounts and would therefore not be covered by Reg DD.

I guess I am still confused. Why was this "change" communicated via your attorneys? I looked and I don't see any recent changes to the estate laws in Ohio. Where are these checks that are going to be deposited come from? Isn't it up to the personal representative to figure out how to manage the estates assets up to the time of distribution? Why would the bank be involved in what type of account the PR needs to set up? I really don't understand the basis of this direction that was recommended.

Sounds like your attorneys do not want to spend the money to open estate checking accounts that may only be open for a short period of time and would rather just open savings accounts? So that means each time the executor needs to disburse funds they would need to come into the bank and request a cashier's check instead of just writing a check from the estate account? so:

the estate never sees a cancelled check with an endorsement - they would have to have a list of the cashier's checks for your bank to provide copies if ever needed?
If a check is lost then you are jumping through hoops for indemnifications etc for issuing a replacement?

Doesn't sound like it is worth the aggravation.