The 3-Day Hold Policy in Full Effect

Next time you go to make a check deposit at your financial institution, don’t get mad at the representative who politely tells you, after agreeing to make the deposit into your account, “I’m sorry, but we have to put a 3-day hold on your check deposit.”  They’re not being mean, or trying to upset the rest of your day.  They are simply working to enforce recently heightened policies in the fight against fraud.

I spoke with a representative at LA Health Care Federal Credit Union who stated when I had gone to make a large check deposit, “we had to change our policies because we’ve been hit with a lot of fraud.”  She gave me other alternatives to having full access to the cash, but that would have meant going to pay check cashing fees which I really did not want to have to do.  Getting annoyed really wasn’t the right way to handle the situation, it wasn’t like I needed the cash to go out on a major shopping spree.  After all I had to look at it as them as working to secure the privacy and protection of my accounts.

The 3-day check hold is not a new policy. In fact it’s been around for decades.  It used to be that you could sweet talk a representative who knew you and knew you had good standing accounts, and the hold could get released with no problems.  Or if there was an error on the banks end  that was proven, as a courtesy to the customer (and as an apologetic effort), they would release the hold to avoid any bad blood between them and their valued customer.

Today are there is an increased number of financial scams that thousands of consumers have  gotten caught in, schemes promising financial freedom, which were simply fraudulent attempts to steal from  you and the financial institutions.  They usually involve Western Union transactions where you a check or cashier check from resource, and you cash it and keep a percentage, forwarding the rest to another resource via Western Union.  There are documented cases where lawsuits have been filed and money collected to cover the loss.  Although, the individuals who were caught in the bogus financial scheme never regain what they’ve loss and find themselves repaying the financial institutions for the cost of recovering what they lost.

If a 3-day hold is place on your check deposit, it’s simply an opportunity for your financial institution to contact you in case there’s a problem with your deposit, you have an opportunity to fix it before things become worse than just receiving a phone call.

Detecting a bogus payment instruments is simple and requires very little effort.  Cashier checks have watermark features and are cut with specific measurements.  If you receive a cashier check and the cut is wrong, the paper is too thin and flimsy, and there is no present watermark or where to sign or that specific information that is usually on a bank drawn cashier check, call the bank right away to verify your suspicions.  In most cases you will be asked to turn over all information you have pertaining to that document.

In today’s unstable economy, consumers can’t be too careful when keeping an eye on the bottom line of every dollar they work hard to earn.  Safeguarding incomes comes with no limitations, so it shouldn’t be any surprise that banks and credit unions are changing or have changed their policies for the benefit of protecting their customers.  They are continuing to take one more step  towards winning the war against fraud.