21 Jul 2015

Can you withdraw money from bank account of deceased Person?

The very topic is puzzling. In the olden days of manual banking system in India, the banks used to mark on the manual ledgers or books of account on getting even an unconfirmed report about the demise of the customer of the Bank and the Banks and other financial institutions were put at caution or alert. With the automation the scenario has changed altogether. Now everything is possible through codes and password and any one can pass on his or her credentials of digital assets to trusted contacts

Imagine the following situations  and Ask Yourself :        Is it Legally Valid

                                                                               Yes            No

Wife, son or daughter withdrawing money from the
account of the deceased through ATM when ATM PIN
is known or intentionally passed on by customer            _____     ______

Liability Created through online shopping via
Credit Card immediately after death.                            _____     ______

Bank Balances transferred through Internet
Banking or Mobile Banking so as to deceive the
other legal heirs of the deceased after death
(Pass words and security questions are generally
made available to trusted son/daughter/wife)                 _____     ______

Stocks and Shares transferred or sold through
Digital Demat accounts                                               _____     ______

Post Dated signed Checks lying with 3rd
Parties in Good Faith, en-cashed after death                  _____     ______

I can foresee that in the times to come, in near future, title to property will also be kept in digital Dematerialized form with online sale and purchase transactions being carried out through property registrar's websites owned by the Government to check evasion of stamp duty along with the aim of having Cash Less Corruption Free Society in India or World Over.

I invite the legal experts all over the world to discuss the social issues hidden in the topic, which is not far away from reality. If we plan in advance then we can nip the burning issue in the bud instead of society fighting each other for easy money - the creator of all evils in the civilized society. 

What could be the possible solution - My Opinion

The world community at large needs to strengthen its registrar of births and deaths as a Central Population Regulatory Authority of India, for existing populations through Unique Identification Numbers as launched in India, Social Security Numbers as in vogue in United States, in such a way that each and every birth or death is registered in online records within not more than 24 hours so that computerized algorithms put a mark of caution on email ID's, Facebook, Google or Yahoo profiles of the deceased persons and if the Bank Accounts, Assets are linked to the Unique Identification records, it will trigger a chain reaction in such a way that no outsider without proper authority will be able to sneak into the privacy including accounts maintained by the deceased persons. In case of births all the facebook or mail servers can create an unclaimed account on the basis of date, time and place of birth along with the name of father or mother, who should be asked the registrar of births to claim the Unique Identification Number allotted to the new born and Educational Institutions must not enroll the child till his or her Unique Identification Number is claimed by the parents.                              

No comments:

Post a Comment

To check spams comments are published within 48 hours.