Pacific Western Bank

Employees tried to make it as difficult as possible for me to roll over my IRA CD to another organization without paying a steep penalty. The account was for two years with automatic renewals if I didn’t instruct otherwise. I came into the bank a few days ahead of the maturity date and explained that I’d be out of state through the maturity/grace period. I asked that they not renew the CD, that upon my return I’d tell them where to send the money. Impossible! It WOULD renew and I’d pay a high early-withdrawal penalty from the principal if I came in a few days after the grace period. Executives from the organization I wished to roll over the CD to (and who deal with rollovers all the time) called the bank to see what was required in order to do a roll-over during the maturity/grace period. They described it as a very contentious phone call and they weren’t able to comprehend what bank employees wanted. At any rate, employees wouldn’t accept any instructions by phone, fax, or electronically so I cut short my trip and personally came to the bank to do the rollover. They refused to since I didn’t have a form from the organization signed by me acknowledging that I wanted money sent there. Hello, I was there in person telling them where to send the funds. The only way I could get my money was to take it as a distribution they said. So I did. The receiving organization told me they would advise the IRS that the money was reinvested so I wouldn’t owe taxes on the “distribution.”