qssue

Hi,
I am hoping someone on here can help! We recently sold our Florida property to fund our move to New Zealand. We live in the UK and have a Wells Fargo account with approx $150K in. They will not allow us access to the funds unless we are there in person to withdraw or wire it. Has anyone else had this problem or any ideas of how we can obtain our funds. Wells have been particularly unhelpful, hitting us ever time with NO: Any advice would be helpful

Thanks
Sue

Pulaski

Without knowing a little more anything anyone says would be a guess, but it could be something as simple as concerns about fraud, or gaps in documentation required for regulatory compliance. From the little you said, you appear to have two questions - what is the problem? And how do you fix it? Demanding that the give you your funds may only exacerbate the problem, so focus first on identifying the problem. It is most important to stay calm, and if you can't get answers to "why?" ask what you need to do, given that you are in the UK and can't visit a branch.

It sounds like you've been phoning them (?) so if you can't get satisfaction by requesting to speak to a supervisor/ manager, then I'd recommend putting your request in writing (use FedEx or another premium courier so you can track receipt). You could ask the attorney you used to sell your property to act/ask for you.

rallybug

I wonder if you could ask them if it could be sorted out by you visiting the office on Fenchurch St, in London - it's not a branch, but they might be able to cross the 't's and dot the 'i's if that is all that is required?

Pulaski

The Fenchurch St office is a completely different part of the organization and there is nobody at that location who would be permitted to get involved.

AmerLisa

I was not aware that an attorney was needed to sell a property?

I agree with Pulaski. Ask them what you can do and if the person you're talking to doesn't seem helpful, go further up the chain. I'm sure you've thought about this, but with so much money at stake, can't someone fly over and sort it out?

qssue

HI, Flying out looks lik our only option, we have tried a power of attorney, wire to Barclays $ account, I am so frustrated, as they never informed us that there would be a problem once we sold our house. We have done wires before to the UK, but, as we now do not have an address in the US, we can no longer wire! To top it all off, they have blocked our account, so we will have to wait for this to be remove prior to flying over. Nightmare

DMDA

I'm not sure if it will help in this situation, but when I need to sign remortgage papers, the US bank sent me the paperwork and I was able to sign and get it verified at the US embassy in London. If it's just a case of proving your identity, perhaps that's an option you could look into?

MMcD

Hi Sue:
Your plight sounds disturbingly familiar. Wells Fargo are notoriously unhelpful and ill-informed. That I know - from personal frustrating experience.
If you're in London - I'd suggest you go to Citibank International. That's their Canary Wharf Branch.
If that's not convenient - at least ring them up; insist on speaking to a Supervisor.
Lay out your plight.
Ask how they can/ will assist. Ideally you want your funds transferred in $s ( you do not want them converted until they reach your New Zealand account ). Under no circumstances should Wells Fargo do any $ conversion (their fees for doing so are thru-the-roof). And I believe EFT (electronic funds transfer) is the manner in which the transaction should be done - in order to avoid additional fees.
It may be that you'll have to open a Citibank account in UK (?).....and then -once you've established residence in New Zealand - an accn't there - which Citibank International should be able to sort out for you.....

Hope this has helped spark a course of action/resolution.

http://www.citibank.co.uk/personal/b...m#receiveMoney

qssue

Hi, Thanks, my husband is currently in Florida with an appointment at Wells Fargo at 9.30am Monday Morning, then flying home at 3.00pm. It has cost us £600 and the only weekend he gets off in 6 weeks
Had they of actually informed us at any point, our title company could have transferred it directly to our FX company.

tonrob

He jumped on a plane to Florida just in order to be able to make a withdrawal from a bank? That sounds ridiculous!

cranston

Open an account with xe.com. Via XE.com you can 'pull' the money from Wells Fargo for the $ sale side of the transaction and have the your money deposited by XE anywhere you want.

No visit to any Wells branch needed.

Pulaski

One other thought- ask WF to send the money back to the closing attorney and then have the attorney reissue the payment in a manner of your choosing - wire, or draft. Whatever Wells Fargo's concern is about your account will be mitigated by paying the money back to the account/ payer from whence the money came. Unfortunately getting WF to do this will likely require speaking to a supervisor or manager.

Pulaski

Except that the OP already said that the a/c has been blocked by WF (no debit transactions are permitted), otherwise they would have been able to write themselves a cheque and would never have had a reason to post a question here in the firstplace.