Armless man denied check cashing for not giving thumbprint / Amarillo, TX: newschannel10.com — You have to wonder how dumb people are at these banks. What an idiotic situation to let happen.
A Florida man born without arms says a bank would not let him cash a check because he could not provide a thumbprint.
That man is Tampa resident Steve Valdez. He says he tried to cash a check from his wife last week at a Bank of America location in downtown Tampa.
He says he presented two forms of identification but was told by the branch manager he’d have to come back with his wife or open an account himself.
If no thumbs, couldn’t they have taken a print from somewhere else?
I meant a toe you in the back!
Doesn’t the ADA say that you have to make reasonable accommodation for disabled people? This is a case for that.
I’ve never given a fingerprint to cash a check==but then I have cashed checks at my own bank where I have an account.
BofA seems reasonable to me. You don’t need reasonable accommodations when the differently advantaged are capable of complying with the same rules as everyone else.
What would expect from a bank that STILL advertises on the Glenn Beckkk show
So open up a $25 savings account, or be added to the wives account. Handicap aside, most banks will not let you cash a check if you don’t have an account. This has more todo with some local reporter looking for headlines than discrimination.
hmmmm.. it’s certainly reasonable for the bank to require specific ID, and to generate a truly reliable record of who cashes a check.
This is stupid, but I suspect it’s an agency problem – the employees involved are not authorized to make exceptions, so they don’t, even when they themselves think one should be made.
I can’t say I would have been willing to risk my job for this guy’s convenience. Those who have chimed in against the bank here – would you?
Tough situation.
I do think it’s likely the ADA applies here, and that this guy will have a cause of action against BOA as a result of this incident.
I’m surprised they wouldn’t cash the check. In my experience they’re usually willing to do anything you want because it allows them another excuse for a hefty fee.
BAD pun..
They dont have a leg to stand on..
At least he wasn’t all thumbs.
If they allowed it, then armless people would be there cashing bogus checks.
I give bank of america two thumbs up!
Another example of liberal bias. This guy was trying to rip off the bank, and now he was stopped so he knows he can count on you do-gooders on the left to get him some cash settlement.
Run and cry to the press like a baby and all the lefty loons come running out and then he cashes in.
Democrats are ruining this country. Wake up, accept Christ and forget about these crazy limbless heathen liberals.
Put your money in a nonprofit credit union. Vote with your dollars.
30 years ago my wife and I had BofA “dim bulb”
bank managers had dumb stuff pulled on us.
We both withdrew all our money and closed
our accounts and moved to our local credit
unions. We have never regreted it.
Yep – that happened to me as well. I went there once to cash a check and was denied for refusing to give a thumb print.
A total shame he was missing his middle fingers too!
Even though I’m a lib, I find myself turning into the what conservatives USED to be, before they got all the power and then trashed the constitution in their post-911 panic.
It BUGS me that I am asked to give my zip-code when I buy something.
It BUGS me that a company keeps me credit card number if I use it once with them. Then, they stupidly let it get stolen.
It BUGS me that companies have me sign a digital pad, so they get to keep my signature to use or mis-use as they wish.
Believe me, my list is much longer.
I’ve never been asked for a thumb-print to cash a check, but it will surely BUG me if they do.
Worse pun.
The guy is also to blame for trying to cash a check with out an account.
No one in this incident has clean hands.
I’m sure this is a written policy at BofA. I have to bank there and know whereof I speak. They just started putting in new ATMs that try to read the actual deposit item instead of letting you put them into an envelope. Trouble is they refuse to recognize as money two of the three things that absolutely positively cannot bounce — money orders and checks drawn on the US treasury. The problem is that neither of these has the magnetic ink numbers along the bottom and so therefore they are worthless.
alfred..
HOW can we ruin america..
The CORPS own it.
We are trying to RUIN the corps..
I guarantee the teller was either a chick in a burqa or some guy with 17 syllables in his last name.
Obviously this guy was a liberal who didn’t understand the Constitution’s Second Amendment right to bear arms. As DUMBYA would say “He deserves my silence.”
Sh!!, don’t tell anyone, but… I am pandering to conservatives.
#4 They advertise on the Glen Beck show because of the ratings. Millions of people watch the show apparently including you.
20 ECA,
“HOW can we ruin America..
The CORPS own it.
We are trying to RUIN the corps..”
I am trying to figure out if you are fatalistic or realistic. You have an interesting analysis that seems to have some kernels of truth.
So, as American’s what do we put first???
1.)individuals or corporations?
2.)the poor, middle class or wealthy?
3.)party or country?
4.)ideology or the good for the most people?
5.)commonwealth or tax entities?
6.)religion or secular pluralism?
7.)people or citizenship?
8.)human-hood or legalisms?
9.)meritocracy or access?
10.) individual rights or community rights
11.) security or liberty
…..add to it if you like….
Guess it is all about political correctness to a tee
How will this fellow sign his checks and pay his Visa bills for travel ?
It is a shame that this man wasn’t an illegal alien. I’m sure BofA would have bent over backwards to accommodate him if he were.
Makes you wonder if this is the Governments backdoor way of enlarging the FBI’s fingerprint database?
My girlfriend banked at a place that wanted to charge her a one dollar fee to get an account balance. She told them that she was closing her account and to bring her her money so she could count it herself. We drove to the credit union where I banked after that and she opened an account there.
All these banks are stupid. The only requirement for cashing a check drawn from the bank it’s taken to for cashing is that you prove that you are who the check says it’s to. That’s it. I can remember a time when banks were required to cash checks from their bank provided the account had money in it. What happened to that? I’ve heard that some banks charge $10 for cashing a check drawn from their bank if you don’t have an account there. Bad things happen when accountants run the show…
In my former life, i did 13 years in bank operations. (I escaped, thank Dog!)
#17, Greg…If all these things BUG you so, use cash! All of those measures were implemented for your own security and convenience, and you agreed to all of them either when you opened the accounts or subsequently when you kept using them.
To those promoting credit unions…they are great until you need something they can’t do. Then, if you don’t also have an account at a commercial bank, you’re stuck.
Money order can and do bounce and can and do have stop payments issued on them. Rare, but it happens. Fed checks are the most commonly forged kind of check there is. Both are subject to a much higher than average irregular endorsement problem. Funds aren’t everything you know.
Now, I take it that this guy was not a customer of Bank of America. So, they are under no obligation to cash checks for him. Banks will cash checks drawn on them for non-customers as a convenience to their account holders, but they are gonna be damned sure they get the right payee. Checks cashed with a forged endorsement can come back up to 7 years later!
Finally, as someone related, this is now a policy, and since banks no longer have real managers that can make real decisions in the branches, despite the title “manager”, I’m willing to be that no one in the branch was authorized to override the policy. The man wasn’t even a customer.
I myself lost it with BOFA several years ago when one of their tellers told my apartment manager that my rent check wasn’t good despite having a $10,000 overdraft protection on the account. A classic case of a stupid and uninformed employee losing business for a company. Happens all the time. Welcome to America.