California Woman Moves Her Money After Being Blocked From Her Own AccountLast spring, Sandee Molenda says she was told by a doctor that her 75-year-old mother, ill with cancer and a systemic infection, didn't have long to live.
"Your mother's circling the drain," Molenda, 49, recalls the doctor saying.
In April, she went to her mother's Citibank branch to set up a trust account that would allow her to take over her mother's finances, which consisted of a few thousand dollars in savings and checking accounts and a certificate of deposit.
"I specifically asked that we do whatever Citibank required in order to make the transition as easy as possible upon my mother's death," Molenda wrote in an email. "I spent over two hours at the bank signing paperwork as a signatory on the account and was assured that there would be 'no problems.'"
Molenda, who runs a parrot business, says she had no trouble with the account for two months after her mother's death at the end of June. But when Citibank found out about the death -- the event for which the account specifically had been set up -- the bank freaked and blocked the account. Molenda said that after several phone calls, she was told the bank blocked the account "because one of the signatories had died."
Duh.
Her mother's checks started bouncing and bills went unpaid. Molenda went to the branch, where she said Citibank employees told her they understood the problem but just couldn't fix it. "At least you don't have to worry about ruining your mom's credit, because dead people can't get credit," she said a manager once told her with a laugh...
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/11/california-woman-moves-he_n_416746.html
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