I have to applaud Bodden Town MLA Alva Suckoo’s motion to enable local banks to settle transactions among themselves through electronic clearance.

I have news for him, however. They already do. Except, the money disappears from your account but doesn’t get credited to the other account for three to four BUSINESS days. The banks use it themselves!

I hope this motion will also include the time it takes for clearance of an overseas cheque that presently takes FIFTEEN BUSINESS days. If I deposit a cheque from my UK account into my local chequing account it actually takes up to 19 days because of the Saturday and Sunday. The “strange” thing is that the money moves from my UK account within 12 hours of me writing the cheque!

I am sure the reason for the lack of support he got from his PPM colleagues when he was part of them was some conflicts of interest. Some of his members are directors of local banks.

Suckoo’s motion is opening up a “can of worms”.

It is going to be interesting what the debate on the motion will produce, if anything, and who supports the motion and who doesn’t.

On another related matter at how slow banks are to resolve problems is one close to my heart.

An elderly lady who worked for a local company here that the old Barclays Bank was the major shareholder took out a very small loan when she bought a parcel of land over 30 years ago. The loan was paid off within 12 months, even though she had been given four years to pay it off.

A charge, of course, was placed by Barclays on this piece of land. Though it was paid off, the charge was never removed. It was the lady’s responsibility to have the charge removed. Not the banks and the lady failed to do this.

Move on thirty or so years and the lady now has a buyer for this piece of land and is pleased as “times are hard”. The lady is now in her 80’s.

The land cannot be released to the buyer because the charge has not been removed. It should be simple because Barclays Bank will have records showing the loan was paid. After THIRTY years if it hadn’t they would have taken the piece of land and sold it themselves!

Simple, however, it is not because Barclays Bank no longer trades here. CIBC First Caribbean Bank now own Barclays and they have no record of either the loan or its paying off. So they will not take off the charge and the piece of land cannot be sold.

The bank have told the lady it is not the bank’s fault, it is Lands and Survey. On contacting Lands and Survey they say it is not them and have proposed a simple solution and have not heard back from CIBC.

The lady is not alone. There are other persons in exactly the same situation and this has been a problem of nearly a year and no attempt by CIBC to resolve it,

The lady is now going to have to go through the courts as this is the only recourse and will be costly. CIBC are aware of it and really don’t care at the misery they cause.

I will keep you posted at what (if any) development and would love to hear from anyone else in the same or similar boat. I hope it will be smooth sailing but knowing the bank I expect it will be a rocky ride on stormy seas.