St.George Bank ATM Withdrawal limit now = $1000

Discussion in 'Markets & Economies' started by Ilikemetals, Jul 31, 2012.

  1. Ilikemetals

    Ilikemetals Member

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    Just wanted to share something with you guys. How you interpret this is up to you.

    Was buying a car 2nd hand off a guy recently and tried to get cash out to pay him, but the ATM rejected me for having too low a cash withdrawal limit. Interestingly, my limit has always been about $10k and I was only trying to withdraw $3k so the limit had been changed without the bank notifying me of this change.

    Went into the bank today asking the teller to raise the limit back. My request was declined. She said that until further notice, all St.George bank accounts have a $1000 per day ATM withdrawal limit and that nobody was exempt. She explained that if i wanted more cash, I would need to go into a branch from now on and request the money in advance. The reason for this is to apparently, "prevent scams". Seems like an extreme thing to do in order to control 'scamming'. I mean... $1k, seriously!? Why not $3k or at least $5k? You can't do much with $1k..

    This rule does not apply if I purchase something in a store. The limit is much higher for purchases. So basically, they don't mind people "scamming" retail, that's perfectly fine. Seems more like a control on removing cash from the system to ME.

    So basically, the freedom to withdraw our own money has been greatly reduced. Not to go all tin-foil on everyone, but something seems a little suss here. I know over in europe and a few other places that bank runs have been an issue. Bank runs are always an issue in times of economic distress - plenty of historical examples. Might be some form of future proofing to prevent everyone rushing to get their cash out of their bank accounts if that scenario was to ever culminate into reality.

    I really feel uncomfortable about this. Regardless of the reasoning behind this change, I no longer have control over my OWN money. All the bank has to do is close their branches and all of a sudden nobody can get access to anymore than $1k of their savings per day. Talk about a huge breach of our liberties.
     
  2. Lunarowl

    Lunarowl Active Member Silver Stacker

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    It's probably almost 1 year since they did that :)
     
  3. Dogmatix

    Dogmatix Active Member

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    I'm with StG aswell, and it's been longer that for at least 6 months and I posted about it on here. The excuse they used was to ' reduce fraud', or scams as you say, but to me I'd say it was to:
    - prevent a bank run, or
    - force people to move into electronic transactions, or
    - reduce ATM cash filling costs, or
    - align business practices with westpac a bit more

    It's bad anyway. Plus they barely advertised it. When I searches for info on their website and on the internet I really struggled to find anything, although that was months ago.

    What I didn't know was how you'd been treated, its interesting.
     
  4. hiho

    hiho Active Member Silver Stacker

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    you never have had control, the fact you have to phone forward your intent to withdraw an amount greater than even $5k is propostorous. Pull your fiat out and change it into gold denominations no greater than $5k in value, for easy cash at the bullion dealer. ;)
     
  5. Chilli

    Chilli Member Silver Stacker

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    I was reading this article this morning,

    Quote
    A man I know works in a major British bank in the risk assessment department. He writes reports for the board of directors and attends board meetings. He told me that the heads of all the banks meet once a month to collude on strategies.

    One of the reports he saw was a pdf of the new exchange control regulations drafted by the European Central Bank.

    The central banks are terrified of capital flight as Europeans flee the collapsing euro. The new laws will prohibit holders of euros changing them into Swiss francs, or US dollars, or any other currency.

    And the document he saw said that cross-border flows of the euro will be disallowed.

    So a Frenchman sending euros to Germany escaping the bankrupt French banks, will not be allowed to move his money, or withdraw it in any large sums. People will only be allowed to use their money in the European country in which they live.

    In Italy, the most you can take out of a bank in cash is 1000 and the Italians are prohibited from opening accounts in Switzerland.

    In the Mexican crash (1994) they imposed exchange controls while the peso lost over 90% of its value, people were wiped out of their life's savings. The same happened in Argentina (1999-2002).

    The idea is to imprison people financially as their money becomes ever more worthless.

    Get cash out, buy gold and keep the receipt. In Singapore the banks won't buy your gold unless you can prove where you got it from.

    And then move any substantial euro assets into the Swiss franc ASAP.

    My contact says he does not know when the new controls will be activated but all the banks know about it, and the exact timing will do with the extent of capital flight.

    If money starts to leave the eurozone in very large sums then the controls will come in overnight. The banks all know Greece is leaving the euro, they call it Grexit.

    My contact said he would be amazed if the new laws were not activated by Christmas this year.

    Unquote.
     
  6. Prior

    Prior Member Silver Stacker

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    Bank west ATMs have a $900 withdrawal limit.
     
  7. vishy

    vishy Member

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    Chilli,

    Do you have a link to the article you posted?
     
  8. Chilli

    Chilli Member Silver Stacker

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    www.stuartwilde.com

    edited to add, scroll down about 1/3 page.
     
  9. willrocks

    willrocks Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Capital control ... coming soon to a bank near you.

    Remember, this is how capital flows from the system:

    Derivatives \
    Equities }---> Cash -> Gold -> Silver -> Food
    Gov Bonds /


    I think we're entering the cash phase.
     
  10. Black_Sun

    Black_Sun New Member

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    "If you don't hold it, you don't own it."

    It's quite ironic isn't it? People love to say (regarding precious metals), "If you don't hold it, you don't own it." And yet, if you were to ask them what it was they used to purchase their precious metals, was it cattle? was it oil? was it grain? "No", they would say, "I used fiat."

    Then you ask them, "Where is your fiat now?" And they'll say, "It's in the bank." And you reply, "Geez isn't that a bit dangerous? Because it means you don't own it! And you want to use something you don't own - because you're not holding it - in order to purchase precious metals, in order that you can hold them, in order to claim ownership?!" Geez wayne... might make sense to you, but the rest of us are baffled. You may never have passed your Logic 101 course at university, but the rest of us passed with flying colours. :)
     
  11. willrocks

    willrocks Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Most Australians don't pass basic logic tests when it comes to money.

    Some I know actually believe there is a % of gold in $1 and $2 coins. So I can understand how they've been fooled. However logically shouldn't the $1 coin be smaller than a $2 coin?
     
  12. Black_Sun

    Black_Sun New Member

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    Ha ha ha... :lol: it never ceases to amaze me how ignorant some people are. Every fool knows that a $1 has no gold in it, and never has! Its only the $2 which contains a few grains of gold. :)
     
  13. willrocks

    willrocks Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    This is gold. A quote from wikipedia:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_2_dollar_coin

    Get the gold pens out.
     
  14. Dogmatix

    Dogmatix Active Member

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    Two 5c pieces glued or blutack'ed together and put in a vending machine. I think it used to work for a little while.
     
  15. Big A.D.

    Big A.D. Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    You used to be able to do it with the old gravity-fed coin mechs. All the new ones have counterfeit detectors in them.

    I've got a whole pile of stuff that has come out of vending machine reject bins (related to my old job). Some of it is just pathetic but a few things are actually quite clever.
     
  16. mmm....shiney!

    mmm....shiney! Administrator Staff Member Silver Stacker

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    And is basically happening again in Argentina.

    Just as an aside, did you know Argentinians were amongst the wealthiest on earth in early 20th Century apparently? "As Rich as an Argentine" - http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/blog/as-rich-as-an-argentine

    Now why on Earth would you do that?
    Can anyone confirm this?
     
  17. hiho

    hiho Active Member Silver Stacker

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  18. willrocks

    willrocks Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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  19. hiho

    hiho Active Member Silver Stacker

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  20. mmm....shiney!

    mmm....shiney! Administrator Staff Member Silver Stacker

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