Singapore Expats

I am extremely hacked off with OCBC today. They have just returned a cheque I tried to deposit advising they cannot process it as the name on the cheque does not match the name in my passport.

It is quite normal in the UK to have a cheque made out to to Mr S ***** rather than full name including middle name.

The cheque is from the UK Inland Revenue with supporting letter showing it is a tax refund.

Plus I had the same situation last year, admittedly for a lower amount, which OCBC did process. Difference was last year around 6k GPB this year 9k GBP.

I am of a mind to tell them to shove their bank account where the sun doesn't shine and move my assets to another bank.

Anyone have experience which might suggest another Singapore bank would accept the cheque and process it?

Steve1960 wrote:I am extremely hacked off with OCBC today. They have just returned a cheque I tried to deposit advising they cannot process it as the name on the cheque does not match the name in my passport.

It is quite normal in the UK to have a cheque made out to to Mr S ***** rather than full name including middle name.

The cheque is from the UK Inland Revenue with supporting letter showing it is a tax refund.

Plus I had the same situation last year, admittedly for a lower amount, which OCBC did process. Difference was last year around 6k GPB this year 9k GBP.

I am of a mind to tell them to shove their bank account where the sun doesn't shine and move my assets to another bank.

Anyone have experience which might suggest another Singapore bank would accept the cheque and process it?

I've opened up an account with an Australian bank (ANZ) in Singapore to get around this exact same problem! My rental cheques from tenants were being knocked back by the local bank every month...

Similar experiences here. I got into some difficulties last year when DBS refused to clear a cheque just ahead of me having to make a bunch of payments out of the account. The supposed problem was that the cheque was addressed to initial surname when, for whatever reason, the account is in the name of surname firstname middlename.

What frustrated me is that I am sure I had paid in cheques before with all manner of variations of my name. And what's the point of writing your name and contact number on the back of the cheque if they're not going to call you when a problem like this arises?

They are all hopeless.

My only advice is don't switch to HSBC. They're worse. I've lost track of how many cheques we had rejected for various idiotic reasons.

Not encouraging guys!

I called Standard Chartered and they said the same thing despite being a UK bank. Will try some others but it looks like I will be mailing the cheque to my mother to pay into my UK bank account!

I ditched my ICBC account for the esact same reasoin years ago - but then found other banks are just as bad!
My solution was not using cheques any more - unbeknown to many, rent and other payments can be paid by bank transfer or standing instruction between Singapore banks.
In the few instances where I received a USA checque (the only country I regularly deal with which still widely uses this antiquated method of payments), I sent them to USA for cashing (better to pay a fee than have the hazzle!).

Yes looks like the cheque will be flying back to the UK although (thanks HMRC) they kindly printed my Singapore address on the cheque so I don't know how the UK bank will view that!

I swear money laundering is easier than trying to legitimately use the banking system

Fingers cross but I didnt encounter this problem with OCBC. How about Citi?
Do you use currency accounts and get yourself a RM? The ones at Citi are slightly more intuitative. Having a GBP /USD/SGD account all wrap up into the same bank/account is quite useful and helpful

Hubby's check was returned when he tried to deposit it into his citibank account as it also had my name on the check. It was a refund check from IRS and we filed joint return. This is in the US. Citibank had done that in the past, whenever there is more than one name on the check, despite proper endorsements.

Citibank gave me a hard time because my foreign check was first name, last name and my account was first, middle, last.

I had a long discussion with the teller that this was the norm where I was from and that it wouldn't be possible to have the check re-issued with all 3 names (government check). She finally checked with her manager who hummed and hawed and said they'd try but she wasn't sure what would happen necause she didn't think the issuing bank would honor the check wifh my name like that.

About 2 weeks later, the check ckeared without incident...

Are cheques gradually being phased out?

martincymru wrote:Are cheques gradually being phased out?

I thought so until I moved here. I still pay some of my bills with cheque. Think I used cheques more frequently in the earlier days so perhaps they are on the wane.

The only cheque I write today is for my friends condo management fees and occasionally for the newspaper man if I'm caught without any money at home when he shows up. Otherwise, it's all online.

brian_singapore wrote:Citibank gave me a hard time because my foreign check was first name, last name and my account was first, middle, last.

I had a long discussion with the teller that this was the norm where I was from and that it wouldn't be possible to have the check re-issued with all 3 names (government check). She finally checked with her manager who hummed and hawed and said they'd try but she wasn't sure what would happen necause she didn't think the issuing bank would honor the check wifh my name like that.

About 2 weeks later, the check ckeared without incident...

This was exactly what happened the first time I tried this back in January. I went into my OCBC branch to have the same discussion last night. They had no logical reasons for not accepting to process the current cheque so they finally fell back on 'we have changed our internal policies since doing this for you before'........................yea right!

same problem here

tried to fast cheque deposit a tax refund chq from HMRC into my DBS account and it was returned after 2 weeks. reason: name mismatch.

called the bank to clarify but to no avail. went to the bank with all kinds of valid id - passport, photo id, proof of spore address, proof of my uk address, my P60, P45, P80, letters from HMRC .... but DBS insisted that the name on the HMRC chq (which was in my initials + surname) did not match my DBS account (which is in my full name on my passport) although the initials of my name matches those on the HMRC chq and yet DBS did not accept and recognise ... this to and fro with DBS took a month with no outcome

end of story: I emailed HMRC to request a direct credit my tax refund into my Natwest acc and it took a day and it was settled.