Trust needs to be notarized?

[Dennis Povloski]

I have a profit sharing plan with 4 participants that was sold to the client by an insurance guy. Each participant's account is invested his or her own variable annuity.

The annuity will only cut a check to the trustee, and they do not process withholdings on distributions. So the plan is needing to set up a trust checking account to deposit the distribution into so that the trustee can cut a check to the participant and process the withholdings on the distribution.

They are trying to set up the checking account, and the legal department at the bank is saying that they can't do it because the signatures on the plan were not notarized, and trusts have to be notarized when executed.

All of the plans I've ever worked with have the trust provisions contained within the plan, and I've never, EVER, seen a plan document notarized when exectuted.

Has anyone out there had this problem with a bank before?

[Belgarath]

Nope. I'd try another bank.

[mbozek]

Never seen a plan document that had signatures notarized. Every plan document/trust that I have ever seen has a provision that authorizes the Trustee to deposit a portion of the plan assets in a bank or financial institution supvervised by the federal or state government including non interest bearing cheking accounts to provide for disbursement of funds in cash which is all the authority that banks want to see.

I would never want a bank with such a requirement to hold any funds for a plan because you dont know what other kookie rules the plan will have to deal with.

[Bill Presson]

Use Penchecks instead.

[Dennis Povloski]

Just in case anyone is interested....Wachovia was the bank that started my frustration. Then I went to Bank of America, who told us that in order to open a trust account, they would have to open it as a personal account, not a business account (ie - "Dr. Smith ttee for the Dr. Smith trust"). So we finally went to SunTrust who knew exactly what we needed, how it should be titled and could help us out. So I think this case is finally closed.

I didn't think about using Penchecks because distributions in this plan will be quite few and far between. I always thought of Pencecks as recurring distributions or handling auto rollovers. Are they really appropriate if the participants are not missing and we'll only be making distributions once every couple years?

[Bill Presson]

Just in case anyone is interested....Wachovia was the bank that started my frustration. Then I went to Bank of America, who told us that in order to open a trust account, they would have to open it as a personal account, not a business account (ie - "Dr. Smith ttee for the Dr. Smith trust"). So we finally went to SunTrust who knew exactly what we needed, how it should be titled and could help us out. So I think this case is finally closed.

I didn't think about using Penchecks because distributions in this plan will be quite few and far between. I always thought of Pencecks as recurring distributions or handling auto rollovers. Are they really appropriate if the participants are not missing and we'll only be making distributions once every couple years?

I think they are even better in that situation becaust you don't have to maintain a bank account. We started using them last fall when the 8109 deposits changed. Been very happy.