redtop43

I thought I had a secure relationship with my bank, but they've closed my account (it was a small regional bank) and I'm having difficulty finding an institution that will accept money orders. I was doing a large volume, maybe $75K/mo.

I'm wondering if anyone can think of options. My primary financial institution is a large national brokerage who doesn't accept money orders at all.

One thing I could probably do is pay my credit card bills partially with MO's, but I wouldn't want to push that too hard.

If it involves an account with a broker, I can bring a low-to-mid 6 figure account over.

Does anyone have ideas/solutions?

lumangoy

am surprised you don't have accounts with other banks/CUs

how about local CUs?

craz

Nothing will make a difference where the OP opens an acct.They wont beable to churn any where 75k a month yet even in 1 tears time. Any new acct that gets tons of MOs will be CXed very quickly

Bout all I can think of is to open a couple of accts and keep the MOs to a min for close to a year, not what the OP is gonna wanna hear Then if still in biz ratch it up slowly over time

redtop43

I'm open to hear the truth.

Maybe the best solution is in fact to open several accounts and lay off the MO's for a year, then do a modest monthly volume in each one. Maybe stick $1K a month from my regular monthly expenses in each one and pay bills out of it so it looks like a normal account.

tuphat

I would try modest amounts through multiple accounts, e.g., 5 checking accounts absorbing $4k per week each in MOs. You could also seed the deposits with checks drawn on the other banks, but be careful not to kite or raise anti-kiting filters.

Also, if you have the liquidity, consider buying short-term CDs (3-month) with the funds accumulating in the checking accounts, rather than immediately using to pay CC bills.

Huzordaddy

Why not go in face to face with the banker, when you open a new account explain that you will be depositing money orders regularly, so they expect them? Don't forget to look for sign-up bonuses.

RedSun

Bad idea. No bank would want to open account for this.

I have no problems at all to deposit a couple MOs each month at local banks or CUs. But very minimal amount.

craz

wont help in the end. There are numerous posts where folks did as you suggested and no problems at least branch wise, but either the computer, regional or corp saw the #s and closed the acct and the banker the person was dealing with couldnt help in any way

tscateh

What about opening and using a small business account?

Klemhuzzah

Forgive my ignorance, but why don't banks like MOs? Seems like NO wouldn't be that different from checks.
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radonc1

MOs have no parentage. What I mean is that there is no way to trace the source of funds used to purchase the MO so the bank has no idea where the funding source arose.
This means that unless they know the depositor very well, there is no assurance that the depositor is not participating in ML activity. No bank is going to tolerate the liability that will accrue to them if they are found to be laundering money.
So, any behavior that even hints at ML is going to be evaluated closely and tossed if judged to be risky.

redtop43

Even when I have offered to show them all the receipts (for gift cards, MO's, bill payments) they still **** their pants. Even when I explain exactly what I'm doing and that there is zero cash involved, they seems to want to wallow in their willful ignorance.

My plan at the moment is to open maybe 5 checking accounts and run them up gradually. Start by depositing maybe $1K/mo MO's in each, along with 1/5 of my monthly allowance. (I retired early and give myself an allowance from my savings to live on; I have no pension or social security.) Then pay 1/5 of my bills from each, including some of the MS accounts. Perhaps build them up in a couple months by going to $2K, maybe buy some CD's along the way.

I'm also going to dip my toe in paying the CC bills directly with MO's. The one of my cc accounts that I've had the longest, has the biggest credit limit, and where I have the strongest outside relationship with the sponsor, I know that in the past I have paid with fairly large amounts of MO's from time to time.

I was doing maybe $75K/mo of MO's, if I can build it back up to even half that over 6-12 months, well, it's still more than zero.

Klemhuzzah

Thanks for the reply.

jmtizzle

what's the easiest/best way to convert vgc to MO in that quantity?

GetawaysRus

Lots of legwork.