OT: Old bank book conundrum

[Tim+]

I found some old bank books for TESSAs held by my parents.

Nearly all of them were clearly closed accounts and showed final balances of zero. Two however still display £9000 in the balance column but the description says ?audited?

It looks like £9000 has been withdrawn which is what I would have expected from the other bank books but at the end of the day, the balance is supposed positive unless the ?audited? indicates something else.

Anyone familiar with banking terminology? Santander were no help as the accounts are too old for them to look up on their systems.

Tim

[John Rumm]

I would guess the MAT CLOS WDL is the account closure and withdrawl. That paid out by cheque/bankers draft - presumably the CLEARED ITEM shown next.

The AUDITED looks like a followup record a month later - not sure what it is telling you, but it looks pretty clear the account was closed and emptied...

[Harry Bloomfield Esq]

Tim+ explained on 31/03/2022 :

Right most column seems to show the present balance and the final entry is £9000, which would suggest that is what is in there. It looks as if maybe £9K has been withdrawn (centre column) and paid back in (left column) - both on the same date. Chase their head office up via email and a scan of that page, plus account details.

[JNugent]

That looks like a £9,000 balance. Yes, the £9,000 in the account was withdrawn or transferred elsewhere, reducing the balance to £0, but the left column indicates a deposit of another £9,000 and a positive balance (therefore) of the same amount.

The book has been automatically updated on a machine, not in manuscript like B/S books used to be, so the likelihood of an error is that much less.

If that book doesn't indicate a £9,000 balance (subject to added interest since 1996), it's hard to see what it does indicate.

You should at least take it into a branch and have the account checked.

[Jeff Layman]

I've seen a similar thing where the account was supposed to be closed when the balance was debited and transferred to another account (so leaving the balance as zero). But, for example, the account number the balance was supposed to be transferred to was incorrect and did not exist, so the transfer was rejected. It then appeared as a credit of the same amount.

I wonder why it shows "Audited" on 11Jan96 and 17Jan96? The 11Jan96 audit confirms the 600.00 transfer the same date, but what's the purpose of the audit 6 days later?

+1

Hopefully someone there will understand exactly what "MAT CLOS WDL" means.

[Jack Harry Teesdale]

As they were 'Tessa' accounts, the MAT CLOS WDL could be short for MATURED CLOSED WITHDRAWAL.

IIRC TESSA were 5 year fixed duration Tax exempt accounts, BICBW.

[Andrew]

I moved my £9000 Tessa capital into my Share ISA and was still allowed the annual £7K ?? contribution as well. Only the accrued interest had to paid out to me directly.

[Andrew]

ROFL

[Andrew]

It means Maturity Closure Withdrawal !

[Theo]

I wonder if 'Audited' was what happened when you went into a branch to get an update on your balance, which was printed in the passbook? Looking at the printing, the 17Jan96 line is with a different ribbon to the entry before or after. It looks like somebody was expecting the tax credit to come through, and maybe went into the branch on the 17th to get a balance update. It hadn't so they waited until 23rd before making a transfer (maybe they had a letter or something to indicate it had happened).

If this is one of those accounts that rolls over to a new year with the same account number (wikipedia calls them a 'Follow-on' TESSA, introduced 1995), it would make sense for the money to have a 'closing withdrawal' and then a new cleared deposit. They couldn't deposit more than £9K into the new TESSA so skimmed off the interest into another account before opening the new year's account. They then went in again on 26th Feb to check their balance again.

It is very possible the bank abandoned passbooks at some point and the record continues elsewhere. (ie quite likely the account doesn't still exist). TESSAs could last for 5 years, by which point they had been replaced by ISAs - quite possible they weren't using passbooks any more in

2001.

Theo

[Tim+]

At a guess, matured, closed, withdrawn.

Tim

[Tim+]

That?s what I did. Too old to be on their systems apparently.

Tim

[Jeff Layman]

If so, perhaps that was a mistake. According to the wiki - and from what I remember - at the end of 5 years you could reinvest the £9000 capital in another TESSA by rolling it over into a follow-on TESSA. If it was

*withdrawn* you could not do that.

Perhaps the intention was to reinvest the £9000 in a follow-on, and by mistake the bank withdrew it. The immediate credit on the same date of an identical capital amount suggests something like that could have taken place.

I had personal experience of a mess-up similar to that which caused a lot of problems with HMRC.