Que. woman's inactive bank account closed
Account had not been accessed for over a year
A client of the Caisses Desjardins bank is pushing for the financial institution to change its policies regarding inactive accounts.
Maud Sévigny said she put money into an account more than a year ago and did not touch it.
When she recently called her branch in St.-Apollinaire, west of Quebec City, to check on her account, Sévigny found that the branch had lost track of her money.
She was told the account did not exist.
"I panicked, all sorts of scenarios were going through my head, like fraud," Sévigny said.
The account was eventually found and the employee told Sévigny that her account has been closed because she had not made a transaction in over a year.
The employee blamed a software problem for the bank account disappearing, according to Sévigny.
Sévigny, who says this is the second time one of her inactive accounts has disappeared at the credit union, took her complaint to the Desjardins ombudsman, who responded in a letter.
The ombudsman said that "studies had already been initiated to improve procedures related to inactive accounts" at the institution.
He did not go into details on what those studies could recommend, nor would the bank comment on the case.
Credit unions under a different system
Sévigny would not have encountered her problem if her money had been with a federal banking institution.
Credit unions are under provincial jurisdiction, and in Quebec inactive accounts are closed after a year, with unclaimed balances transferred to Revenu Québec after three years.
All other banking institutions are under federal jurisdiction. The rules allow for an inactive account to be frozen after two years, but the unclaimed balance is not handed over to the Bank of Canada until 10 years have passed.