We were just curious how everyone does Bank Deposits.We use a National Bank to do our Bank Deposits.I enter the Deposits in an Excel Spreadsheet. We add the Bank Account # to the back of the items and say ‘Deposit Only’. We fill out a Deposit Slip, paper-clip the Deposit Slip to the Items and then placed them in a ziplock bag. My Husband then goes inside the Bank and gives the ziplock bag to the Bank Employee to deposit. He then receives a stamped deposit slip from them.Well, this system has worked well until this week.On 11/7/14 my Husband made a Deposit of 4 items (1 check & 3 money orders…this is actually a very small Deposit in terms of items) inside the lobby of the Bank. The Bank Employee stamped the Deposit Slip and gave it to my Husband.Now when we go online the Bank has removed one of the Deposits ($500) saying that the Deposit did not exist. Well, thankfully these 4 Deposits came from only one Tenant, so we had them email us pictures of the Money Order Receipts.Come to find out the one Money Order was never cashed (as I called the Money Order Company). It was lost somewhere between the Teller and the person who actually photographs the Deposits. There is absolutely no doubt that this particular Money Order WAS given to the Bank Employee as these Deposits were to stop one of our Tenants from being evicted from the Mobile Home. I put the Money Order in the ziplock bag and the Bank Employee took them out. This particular Money Order was physically smaller than the average Money Order.We called the Bank today. They said that they would investigate it (which probably means that they will do nothing). We will probably end up having the Tenant just report that it was not cashed and have it refunded (minus expenses).There is just no excuse for a Bank to stamp a Deposit Slip for a specified amount of money and then take away that money later on.I asked at another Bank if they added up the Deposits and she said no. They just shoot them through this machine and give you a stamped Deposit Slip. So do the Bank Employees reconcile at the very minimum the number of Items that you give them? One of the Banks suggested that they give us (or we buy) this machine that will allow us to do Bank Deposits online. Personally, I thought that this would cause issues. However, perhaps the online Deposit System would be best as we would keep proof of the actual Deposit Items.How do you do your Bank Deposits?We greatly appreciate your comments!Thanks So Very Much!
we have a deposit machine and make all of the deposits ourselves, in the comfort of our office. The machine will deposit into any of our accounts. Simple, end of story.
Thanks Jim!It sounds like we need to get a Deposit Machine :-).
We use Chase for our bank, and we got the ACH machine from them. There are other options as well. We can deposit taking a photo with a smart phone as well. There is some good stuff out there.
This happens to us (relatively) frequently. Sometimes it is an honest mistake, but there is also a scam where the teller pockets the money order.We have the manager xerox the actual money orders/checks prior to deposit, about 3 or 4 to a page, plus they create something similar to Kristin’s “excel spreadsheet”, and then they add a photocopy of the receipt to the bundle after they get back from the bank. We get a PDF scan of all the pages and that is (1) used to book all the rents and deposits in our financial and rent-management programs and (2) kept for a while for reference if/when the receipt does not match the total on the spreadsheet, or the amount the bank later credits does not match the receipt (which happens!). The managers do not have access to the bank info (they are just depositing) so they cannot track down errors themselves.Having the money order number and/or check (routing #, acct#, check#) copy on hand has proved to be helpful many times in tracking down errors (which could be from our manager, or the bank, or ourselves). Errors happen; people are human (most of them anyway :). Having a way to go back and examine what happened is helpful because you can’t always count on residents to produce receipts or proof of payment.That’s our current method, anyway. I’d be very interested to hear more about what other non-local owners do.Brandon@SandellOh, post-script – I found out a while back that when our bank (Wells Fargo) makes a mistake (in their own favor, natch), if it’s under $10 they don’t bother looking in to it unless you ask for the money back.
Brandon, thank you very much!On the Excel Spreadsheet we do write down the type of payment (check, money order, bill pay), the number and amount.However, in the past we have not copied the actual payments. That is a great idea as you are correct that you can not count on the Residents having proof of payment or receipt.Thanks So Very Much!
We have our tenants make the deposits themselves to the local Chase bank, and keep the teller’s receipt for proof of payment. I can see the tenant’s deposit slip online. I record their deposit in a ledger. Once a year I print out 13 deposit slips for each tenant, that has my account number and their space number on it. System works quite well.
I do the same as Brandon and have the manager fill out the deposit slip where they write in the name and amount paidplus a form where they rewrite it with the number of the check or money order.They fax a copy of the deposit ticket with the form. You also have a copy of the deposit receipt from the bank. This is time consuming for the manager but I make sure they know they are doing it to protect themselves. The manager knows how much is being deposited and has the proof to show it in case there is an error. It is kind of archaic but simple.
We use a desktop deposit scanner for payments received in the office and offer the ability for the tenants to pay online using PayLease as the payment processor which is tied to our Rent Manager system. The online payments post directly to the tenant’s account and the money is directly deposited into our bank account. We never have to go to the bank using either of these options. The monthly fee for the desktop deposit scanner more than pays for the time and gas to go to the bank multiple times a month. With the online payments, the tenant pays the fee if they want to use that option so it costs us nothing.
Dshinnick, Brian Z & CCon, thank you so very much for your comments!We greatly appreciate it!
*** UPDATE ***:Here is an update on the Money Order that we gave to the Bank Teller and then it ‘disappeared’.This particular Bank is Bank Of America. I went to another branch and asked if the Tellers verify the Deposits. The Teller stated the following:- Deposits of cash are always verified- Deposits with 3 or less items are verified- Deposits with over 3 items are verified in the ‘Transaction Room’- ‘Sometimes’ deposits get lost in the ‘Transaction Room’ and end up in a pile called ‘Suspended Transactions’- Periodically, the ‘Suspended Transactions’ are gone through to ‘try’ to match them to an account.We called Bank Of America to contest them ‘removing’ the $500 Money Order that we Deposited in their Bank and received a stamped Deposit Slip from their Teller.Bank Of America did end up adding the $500 Money Order back to our Account. Whether Bank Of America found the $500 Money Order or not, we will not know as they probably would not admit if they had found it.The $500 Money Order either got lost between the Teller and the Transaction Room or it was stolen by a Bank Employee.As of last check the Money Order was not cashed. However, I have not checked on it lately.Bank Of America’s Policy to not verify Deposits by the Tellers is NOT acceptable.Going forward we will just give them lots of Deposit Slips with 3 or less items :-).Scanning the Deposits in our office is an option unless it costs us moola. We should not be charged for removing work from their Tellers.We wish you the very best!
thanks for the update. if i just have a few checks to deposit i use the bofa atm. the receipt contains a copy of each check deposited and ive never had a problem. occasionaly I use online banking and scan checks but its slower.
Oceanbay, thank you for your comment!That is cool that the ATM Receipt contains a copy of each check deposited. We are going to try this out :-).Thank you for the info!