# Ulster Bank looking for my updated I.D.......AGAIN.



## Odea (6 Oct 2017)

Yet again the Ulster bank has asked me to bring my customer identification documents to my bank branch. I assume that this is to do with anti money laundering legislation etc.

It seems that this is happening every other year.

Does anyone know how often I am required to do this by law?

They state in their accompanying letter that "we may have to contact you again in the future however we will ensure that we minimize any inconvenience regarding further requests".

It would be useful to know how often I am required by law to do this rather than by someone in the Ulster Bank who seem to be making the rules up as they go along.


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## Itchy (6 Oct 2017)

I have this same experience with EBS! Very annoying.


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## Nordkapp (6 Oct 2017)

Same here for my Ulster Bank UK account despite me using UB internal post and witnessing in the branch here. PIA


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## IsleOfMan (7 Oct 2017)

Same here. I often wonder where and what they have done with the previous documentation that I have sent them. Does any regulator actually go in to any bank and check this out.

Are all my previous bits of paper matched up and kept together.

Are they just thrown in to a different box every time they get updated copies.

Does anybody ever really check the stuff or is it just an exercise that they are required to do.

What makes me laugh is that existing customers just have to "post" in a "copy" of their latest passport/driving licence. I am not sure how secure photo copies of anything is.

Maybe when we bring in our new documentation in to the bank they should be required to hand us bank our old documentation.

Maybe they should be required to give us a dated receipt on accepting our new updated documentation.

I cannot get over how bad Ulster Bank is at everything they do.


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## llgon (7 Oct 2017)

Discussed on a previous request with regard to Danske

https://www.askaboutmoney.com/threads/what-if-i-dont-furnish-proof-of-address-id.196457/

I didn't respond to the request and haven't heard from them since about it.  No adverse consequences that I am aware of despite being told by another poster that I would be blacklisted.


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## Monbretia (7 Oct 2017)

If you don't bring in you might get a few reminders but eventually they will stop, the only risk is that if you want to do a withdrawal other than the automated ones there might have put a block on the account until the new id is in.  

I don't know if anyone goes into the banks to check this out but within the banks it is checked by two people, the one who took it from you and then the 'id' person, can't think of the proper title   a pain of a job!


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## Tintagel (7 Oct 2017)

I was told in the Ulster bank recently that it was every 3 years. In the thread above it says every 5 years. Then again I am told different things by different people in the Ulster Bank whenever I ask a question.

I think being given a stamped and dated receipt from the bank when you produce this I.D. is a good idea.


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## SoylentGreen (17 Oct 2017)

In a letter I received from the Ulster Bank I was asked to bring or post *photocopies* of my passport or drivers licence to the Ulster Bank.

I called to the bank with both my passport and my wife's passport (joint account) as directed but the cashier refused to take a copy of my wife's passport because she was not there in person. This was not a requirement as there was an option for them/photocopies to be posted. She insisted that they had to be certified copies. They didn't.

As I was going to the branch anyhow I thought it would be easier to bring them along rather than stick them in an envelope and post them.

The person at the counter was making up her own rules.

I find that the counter staff are really poor in the Ulster Bank with very little knowledge of their own products and services.


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## Monbretia (17 Oct 2017)

Funny thing is I was surprised you were ever asked for photocopies, it was never the thing in UB that they would suffice, you had to bring in the original which they would then photocopy and stamp certifying the staff member sighted the original.  Alternatively if you couldn't come in person you could send a copy certified by gardai/solicitor and a few other options that I can't remember.

It sounds more like the dept sending out the letter don't actually know branch procedure rather than the staff not knowing.


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## SoylentGreen (18 Oct 2017)

Monbretia said:


> Funny thing is I was surprised you were ever asked for photocopies



If I was a new customer I could understand asking for certified copies. I was only updating my documents. I am a customer of 20 years in the same branch so they have several copies of passports and utility bills already held somewhere? I assume that these are all held together and updated each time, as a previous poster has asked.

I found it strange that a staff member in the branch who would know us from coming in to the branch at least once a month over the past 20 years, sometimes together sometimes just me on my own  would insist that my wife be present when all she had to do was just photocopy my wife's passport and send it to the relevant department in their internal post.


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## Slim (18 Oct 2017)

It's really the regulatory demands that force local banks and credit unions to demand ID from well known customers. I am a member of my credit union for 20 years and a former board member and know most of the staff yet I was asked a few weeks ago to bring in ID and proof of address on my next visit!!


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## Tintagel (18 Oct 2017)

Slim said:


> It's really the regulatory demands that force local banks and credit unions to demand ID from well known customers.


I think everybody understands this and it is something that we have to live with. 

In the case of SoylentGreen above it was an issue with a branch staff member not accepting a photocopy when their head office said that a photocopy was acceptable.

In the case of Odea and Itchy, it seems that the I.D. is being asked for too often than is legally necessary.

In the case of Isle of Man it is a question of how our information is being stored by the banks and if we should be getting receipts when we present the documents.


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## SoylentGreen (26 Mar 2018)

Update to my post 8 above.

Despite bringing both my wife's passport, my passport and address ID to my Ulster Bank branch last October I have received an identical letter today asking me to provide this information again.

What have they done with the information I provided last October or is somebody having a laugh at my expense?

Thankfully I wrote a memo to myself last October with dates, names etc.

I thought that this information was to be kept secure and recorded properly?


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## IsleOfMan (31 Mar 2018)

They have a duty of care to protect the Data that you have already given them. Find out what they did with it and ask to see what information they have on file for you.


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## newbie (3 Apr 2018)

I got a third letter in the last 3 months from Ark Life today about proof of address and identity which I had already submitted so I rang them, said they were automatically generated and apologised and to ignore future letters in future.


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## Laramie (6 Apr 2018)

We maintain a joint account with the Ulster Bank. My wife received a request to update her I.D. on our joint account. I brought both our ID's to our local branch where eventually they accepted them. (long story).

Fast forward a couple of months and now I have received a letter from Ulster Bank to update my I.D. on the same joint account.

I contacted them and advised them that at the time my wife was updating her I.D. on our joint account I also submitted mine.
I have been told that they didn't want my I.D  a few months back so they destroyed it at the time. I have to bring it in now as now is when they want it.

I got no notification to say that they had destroyed my I.D a few months back.


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## Grizzly (8 Apr 2018)

Laramie said:


> I have been told that they didn't want my I.D a few months back so they destroyed it at the time.



I would have thought that the Ulster Bank has a duty of care to maintain your I.D. and not destroy it.


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## Gordon Gekko (8 Apr 2018)

It makes a lot of sense when you think about it. The bank confirm my identity. Why wouldn’t they then need to check periodically whether I’ve morphed into a different person (e.g. had a sex change)?

2016: “We established exactly who you are.”

2018: “We just need to check that you’re still who you were in 2016.”


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## Tintagel (8 Apr 2018)

Gordon Gekko said:


> Why wouldn’t they then need to check periodically whether I’ve morphed into a different person (e.g. had a sex change)?



Periodically is the key word.  There must be some guidelines as to what "periodically" means.

Also destroying documentation that has been sent in by a customer earlier than needed does not seem correct?


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## Gordon Gekko (8 Apr 2018)

Tintagel said:


> Periodically is the key word.  There must be some guidelines as to what "periodically" means.
> 
> Also destroying documentation that has been sent in by a customer earlier than needed does not seem correct?



Is it normal for people to switch identity “periodically”?

The primary purchase of AML documentation is to establish that a person is who they say they are and that they are a real person. Once that has been established, it should not need to be revisited. If I was Gordon and a real person in 2016, that should be the end of it. In reality, this is more about compliance departments creating jobs for themselves and inconveniencing clients/customers.


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## elacsaplau (8 Apr 2018)

Gordon Gekko said:


> ....In reality, this is more about compliance departments creating jobs for themselves and inconveniencing clients/customers.



Agreed. This is an example of what I was referring to yesterday in another thread of people getting rewarded for activities that have dubious societal benefit. [This is not to say that we don't need "compliance" but much of the currently mandated compliance in the areas of financial services that I am familiar with is complete nonsense. Special thanks for this should go to the Central Bank of Ireland who do such a wonderful job in creating so many jobs that otherwise would not be needed.]


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