Forum

PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

ALERT!

Not sure where this belongs to but PC Financial FROZE MY BANK ACCOUNT (6 of them). Asking me who to who were all these people I was getting payments from. I told them they were my partners. They said they did not allow any business transactions to go through their bank.

I thought PC Financial was safe for Stealth?

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

No bank account is a given as being 100% safe for stealth.

Using some personal banks for business purposes may sometimes back-fire.

These are points that absolutely need consideration when a bank account is opened.

Are they working with you on this matter?

:peace:

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

They said they will call me in about 2 days to let me know what is going on. Well I guess we can cross out PC Financial along with Ally ... I just hope they will return my money. That's all.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I guess the only way is to open business bank account as it allows to add DBA.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I have there about $8k. I think I have transferred more money but I am not sure what is going to happen now.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Hoping for the best for you, Stanislav.

I will amend references to this bank as well.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

you gotta say it's 'personal', not business. acct 1 - powerbills, acct 2 - Christmas money, acct 3 - vacation fund, acct 4 - food money, etc. NEVER say business.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

@Greenie, hold off on the amendments. 1 bad report does not make the bank bad for stealth.

1. @Stan, 6 accounts...all chequing? Break it down - you did something that seems to have put a manual review on your accounts - 8k, while high, is not killer unless perhaps...all at one shot.

2. Partners? You NEVER say that - if the bank asks for proof, what are you going to do? Like trig said - always PERSONAL.

3. Bank is going to do a bit of investigation. Likely will hold funds anywhere from 90 days to 6 months.

Keep us posted

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I will keep you all posted.

But how do you explain your bank why you received PayPal payments under different names? And no, 8K was accumulated over some time and transfers were mostly between $500-$700 each time.

I used my main checking account for everyday things such as buying food, filling up my gas tank, buying groceries etc ...

Nothing extraordinary. Even if I did trigger security to look at my account closer, all it means that this bank is not safe as it only takes just one incident to trigger freeze on your bank account.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Thanks for the share stanislav.

This has, at least, made me more aware of the need to spread accounts across multiple banks and keep business accounts and personal ones separate.

Hope things work out w/ you and your bank. Keep us posted.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Thank you for your support!

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I understand stan - did you leave any money in the accounts? The issue is that you cant just state my "partners" because the bank is going to be VERY suspicious. Deposits coming in different names could be stated as just a form mismatch or so on the part of the sender i.e. PP - and we all know how PP can make mistakes...

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

You should have used your GREY matter before making the bank accounts.

You have been stealthing long enough to be aware of the POTENTIAL for trouble(s). These are because one party is paypal and the other party is a bank. Both together are dangerous.

Stop talking silly talk by claiming all your transactions were purer than driven snow. I looked over the posts. Only you ever had glitches. I even got laughed at when I recommended changing banks...
:argue:

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Usually they give you the money.

The few times they keep it ( or at least for an extended period of time ), is when they want your immigration status, suspicion of terr.rrorism, under RICO, and other such nonsense.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I cannot imagine they will keep the money, but I also don't see them allowing you to continue business as usual. Right now, they are worried about some type of fraud going on. You need to convince them that there is no fraud involved here.

The question is not so much about how many dollars each transfer was, but how much money per month was running through the accounts in total? My best guess is that is what triggered a review of your accounts.

Best course of action for the future? Set up BUSINESS accounts with the banks. PayPal will never know the difference. You could also set up PayPal business accounts and use whatever business names you like. But if you want to keep the PayPal accounts personal, that is OK too. Just use the DBA process to make the business name close to being the same as your stealth names. A PayPal transfer to "Seth Young" will not likely cause a problem when it is being deposited to a business account for "Seth Young Guitars". There are a whole lot of ways to be creative with this!

The bottom line is, it is always best to have accounts spread out over several banks and to keep the amount of money running through them REASONABLE. It makes no difference that you only withdraw $600 at a time if there is $10,000 per month running through the accounts. You also want to keep it CONSISTENT! If your average withdrawal is $600, then you want to avoid suddenly taking out $5,000. Just because your bank has your real information does not mean that you don't want to stay under their radar.

When I first started in stealth, I had 2 accounts at Charter One bank. They are actually OK for stealth. But, one month I had nearly $6,000 in deposits to both accounts. One name was a slight variation of my real name and the second was totally different. Their fraud department called me to ask who "Jim Smith" was and why I was receiving money in his name. I told him that "Jim" was my significant other, and that I was just a little offended that their bank would consider our relationship to be "fraud" even if they didn't like gay people. The whole thing quickly became a non-issue. Of course, that was several years ago and this tactic may no longer work. Obviously, this also would not have worked if I had six accounts, all under different names. My point is, be creative. Just make sure you think it through FIRST - the last thing you want to do is create even more suspicion of the accounts.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Likely - and I have past experience with bank holding funds arriving for business in personal account (sigh) - there could be a hold of anywhere from 30 days to 180 days...PC financial is CIBC-owned so (in all likelihood) there wont be a long hold - 30-45 days tops as they do their investigation.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I've been working my brain over, trying to think of an excuse that I would tell the bank if they asked me why I have 8 different names of deposits from paypal.

I guess you could alway's claim mental illness. Sometimes insanity can trump logic.

"Hello, Mr Customer Service rep for the bank,

I never give out my real name to any website online, I only give my real info to my banks because it's against the law not to, but any other website that I do transactions on, I alway's use made up names. I take medication for paranoid schizophrenia because I have delusions that people are trying to steal my identity, and I at times, have thought that that someone is spying on my computer activity. Ebay and Paypal have never given me troubles with using a different name, so I prefer to keep my personal info a secret.

So why so many different names? Because sometimes I think that someone has gotten ahold of my information and is trying to steal my money, so I open new paypal accounts so that they can't steal from me.

blah blah blah"

If you ramble on enough about being crazy, and why you have so many different accounts and names, they might just think you're out of your mind, instead of a very intelligent stealth online entrepenuer.

Might just be crazy enough to work. It doesn't need to be an academy award production, it just needs to be good enough to get your money back from the bank.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Hopefully they don't do a SAR.

Do they have that in Canada too?

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Ha Corleone....that made my day :) don't think the bank would fall for that - or worst comes worst, they would say Errrr right - wait x amount of time then you will get your money and we don't want your business anymore.

The part about not wanting your business anymore happens quite regularly with banks up here for security issues

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

You could just be honest with them and say you spread your transactions across mulitple ebay accounts to keep better record of what sells based on your selling methods in each account and ebay makes it difficult to do from one account so you open several business accounts to allow for this. Tell them you can come down to the bank with your product receipts to show them you are legitimate.

Don't get into specifics about how you open accounts or anything stealthy like that.

Just be matter of fact with them. If they insist on not allowing you to do it say well, how many accounts can I keep. Argue with them on this point by saying you want as many accounts as possible. The way I see it is unless one is committing fraud,(I assume you're not.) then they have every right to be aggressive and aloof. Even demand to talk with the bank manager.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

That might make it even worse...

The banks are not silly. They know that paypal is a hub for fraud and money laundering.

They will want proof for most if not all of stans transactions and then possibly ask for SSN (or whatever numbers canada uses) to verify for each account...

If all other venues fail, i guess he could go into a local branch and try to reason with a manager...but they may not wish to do business with him again.

Please keep us updated, Stan.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Quite true cjmixers - the issue is with saying you have "partners"...they could ask for identity proof of those people though I suspect for 8k, maybe just account termination and statement letter of "We do not want your business after we give the 8k"

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

So you tell the bank that paypal has been mistakenly sending payments to my account in different names all this time? :confused:

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

About that, mistakenly sent payments in different names due to form mismatch or so...but for huge amounts, cant really do much but wait for bank investigation

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I have been asked this question and I told them I had multiple ebay accounts and use a different alias for each and that seemed to be the acceptable answer... I asked them if they wanted me to get DBA to show and they said was not necessary.

Maybe the answer was over (or under) thought a bit. The truth goes a long way with the banks... They are afraid of terrorist and things like that. Once you tell them what it is they are less likely to proceed.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I've been using PC Financial for years with ebay/paypal stealth, and never had any problem with it or know anyone else that had problems with it. They're perfectly fine, you should look into what you're doing yourself instead of blaming it on them.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

PC Financial is operated by CIBC and my only issue with CIBC was when business deposits went to my personal account. CIBC saw that and did cause me some grief so perhaps the same line of thinking is going on. I could foresee that after money comes out to you Stan, you may be barred from using that bank

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Surprising turn of events ....

I went to CIBC ATM today and was able to withdraw $500 without any hassle. They told me a week ago they will turn my case to another department and will call me back in a few days after review. Never heard from them again. My bank account, my debit card and my online banking work perfectly fine. What the hell is going on ???

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

They usually give you 30 days to clear your **** after they make their decision.

At least here.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Count your blessings and learn from this.

I hope they release all of your funds and you can still conduct business with them in the future.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Unless they notify me by mail or phone that I must clear funds within certain amount of time I will continue business as usual. They never called back however they might send me certified mail about termination. If they do I will let you all know.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I've learned one thing and only, never call on behalf of your mother's name. As embarrassing as it is to admit I used my mother's PC Financial to conduct my business. I asked her permission and she was willing to help. When I was sending Western Union I went over the limit and decided to pretend I was her an call PC Financial. That's when **** hit the fan as they did not believe it was her.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Exactly - they will send you a LETTER if they have issues with you...sometimes certified, sometimes not.

Take this as a light slap on the wrist - be careful for future operations.

Avoid using mom's info - try to stick with your own

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

I had my bank account card stolen out my car.

Phoned up PC Financial, right away the supervisor says, Sorry can't help you.

I wanted a new bank card mailed to my home address on the account, I had all my information ready to verify.

I am out of the country, and have my mail forwarded to me every few weeks.


I have all my information to identify myself, and yet the phone "supervisor" says right away, Sorry can't help you.

Do they expect there customers to just lose there money in there system, if they are unable to verify over the phone or what?

This is a non-branch bank, there is no real way to verify yourself other than on the phone.

What can be done now? At the mercy of this corrupt bank.

My advise, Withdraw every single penny you have in this bank, cancel any cards you may have. It may someday be your turn and you will out your money, they will leave you without any way to identify yourself.

I am open to anyone who would like to go on a lawsuit against this bank, there is no doubt of winning.

AVOID PC Financial - Over $2300 gone.

Jemima
Calgary, Alberta
Canada

Taken from RIP OFF REPORT!

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Man, those Rip off Report posts are supposed way off...I dont want to discuss that post too much because I have seen it but it's nonsense - the person can present at any kiosk with ID and she/he would be able to get money. Banks up here are very good about getting money to the RIGHT people with ID verification

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

When I had this happen to me with ING I just stonewalled them, didn't answer any of their questions and said that everything they were asking was none of their business.

Every stock I had through Sharebuilder was instantly sold, and 100% of my funds (Sharebuilder + ING accounts) were transferred to my attached Chase account within 72 hours, and they gave me 2 weeks to transfer the IRA I had with ING to another bank.

But one big gripe I have is that ING filed a 1099 on my behalf that year without sending me the adjoining form. Now I am knee-deep in IRS bullpoopy because of it.


I have not tried to re-sign up with Cap360 since.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Citibank gave me two options when they froze my accounts because of a name mismatch. Either I add that person to my account, or I have him sign an affidavit saying that he authorized my account to accept funds on his behalf. Otherwise in 30 days or so, they will send the money back to the source it came from referencing the mismatch.... Are these empty threats, or do they actually do this?

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Last post on this thread was over 3 years ago. Might be a better idea to start a new thread outlining your problem.

In my opinion the bank is not making an empty threat. Given the person does not exist then you'd be best to let them return the funds (presumably to Paypal).

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

Is there an attorney anyone can refer me to? Some expert in frozen bank funds... could be a paralegal. Willing to pay for the help.

Re: PC Financial FROZE my money!
 

having talked to stanlislav in the past, the avatar is actually him (trying to dance?) - so if they did not believe he was his mother on the phone, I am hardly surprised....dun...

anyone tried writing giving a backdated cheque to their family member to cash out the account? I heard anecdotally that frozen accs will pay backdated stuff sometimes...