On Friday, April 5th attorney Steven M. Berger discusses big banks making their own rules.

Larger banks and financial institutions such as Schwab and Fidelity etc. are what we are discussing today.

Maryland law states that they must accept the Maryland statutory power of attorney form and if not they can be subject to attorney’s fees for enforcement.

Some banks have decided that even if they have to pay attorneys fees, they still don’t want to accept them. Usually these banks are worried about possible forgery or fraud to avoid liability.

For the above reason, we follow the letter of the law and don’t make too many changes to these documents so there should be no question about validity.

Using a trustee under a Will, other than under a Trust can cause issues with a bank.

A way to counteract issues here is to bring the power of attorney into the bank while the grantor still has capacity so any issues can be cleared up beforehand.

Keep your revocable trust up to date such as your agents.

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