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Originally Posted by tracer bullet
I actually thought that was standard, but yeah, I can see it can vary depending on the bank, teller, how busy they are, if they are itching to go to lunch, etc.
I sold a car once long ago, the buyer brought a cashiers check and we went to the bank together with it. We sat off to the side for 5-10 minutes while someone actually called up the other persons bank to make sure the check was real / funds were available. I guess I don't know the details but they did do some work on it. Good reminder to be sure this happens if I ever repeat a sale that way.
So, since you were in the industry and know things, can the buyer empty the account and / or close it before you get a chance to go deposit that check?
For $75k I might actually create an account at the buyers bank for myself, and have it go direct while we are both in the bank itself. I suppose there's a reason not to do that but for so much money I think I'd be a little extra careful as well.
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If you just walked up to me as a teller with a $75,000 cashier’s check and wanted to deposit it and you were alone and didn’t indicate you had any questions about it I would, in fact, just take the check and process the deposit and give you your receipt, but I would not do anything special to check on it right then and there. BUT, it would go into my “large items” transaction bin (as opposed to the bin that holds all the nondescript transactions) and a supervisor charged with reviewing the large items would look at it before it went into the system. Even so, if there was nothing to raise a red flag it would probably go on into the system. In this case it sounds like Kies was with the seller and gave the bank some indication he wanted to verify the legitimacy of the check, so it should have received some immediate scrutiny.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tobster3
I’m not in the industry or know very much about it. However, when I have gone to the bank to get Cashiers checks from the bank for vehicles I am purchasing, the money has come out of my account at that time when the check is issued. So In my experience, I’d say this is not possible.
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You are correct. Banks only issue cashier’s checks once they are paid for in full with guaranteed funds directly from the purchaser. The cashier’s check is an obligation of the bank and is drawn on bank funds from the bank’s cashier’s check account. There’s no chance for the purchaser of the check to somehow close their account to get around paying for the check. The funds are immediately debited from the purchaser’s account. Assuming, of course, the purchaser was paying from their own bank account. It is possible to buy a cashier’s check with cash. And then it is up to the teller to determine that none of that cash is counterfeit. With the amount of genuine currency you handle on a daily basis it is pretty easy to identify counterfeit currency the moment your fingers touch it. Counterfeit currency does not feel like genuine currency. Also, the absolute dead giveaway to counterfeit currency is its lack of imbedded red and blue fibers in the paper. There literally is no other paper that has these imbedded fibers. They cannot be counterfeited. On close examination of counterfeit currency you can see the red and blue “fibers” are merely ink sitting on top of the paper. With genuine U.S. currency you can actually take the point of a straight pin or a safety pin and tease the imbedded red and blue fibers out from within the paper.