Thread: Banks That DO NOT Accept Matricula Consular

I'm looking for a bank that does not accept matricula consular cards as proof of identity. My bank, for 25 years, just started accepting these abominations as proof of identity and I'm in the process of changing banks. Are there lists somewhere, of banks that do not accept them?

Good Question. I dont know of any...

Here is something I found put out by the World Bank in looking for a bank that does not take the card. Read these stats and realize how much we need to fight.

http://www1.worldbank.org/finance/html/ ... _firas.ppt.


Shaping the Remittances Market by Shifting to Formal Systems

Presentation by Michael A. Frias
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation at the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation
(APEC) Symposium
Tokyo, Japan June 3-4, 2004


Bush – Fox
“Partnership for Prosperity�
September 2001

Action Plan
“…work to lower the cost for Mexicans working in the United States of sending money home by, in part, encouraging banks to market aggressively the opening of accounts to Mexican workers and to offer remittance features in their accounts.�

Bush – Fox
“Partnership for Prosperity�
September 2001
Action Plan (cont’d.)
In January 2004, President Bush reaffirmed the White House commitment to “reduce by at least 50 percent the cost of sending money home to family members and local communities by 2008.�

Emerging Market and Business Opportunities
Demographics
34.5 million foreign-born in U.S.
9.2 million or 30% are Mexican
Hispanic-Latino population projected to grow by 258% between 1995 and 2050

Emerging Market and Business Opportunities
Buying Power
Hispanic buying power in the U.S. will jump 89% between 2000 and 2007, from $491 billion to $926 billion

Emerging Market and Business Opportunities
Remittances to Latin America
2004 - $40 billion to Latin America (estimated)
2003 - $38 billion to Latin America
2003 - $13.3 billion to Mexico [a flow of $36 million per day]
Illinois has $1.5 billion of this market

Emerging Market and Business Opportunities
Players in the Remittance Market
Money transfer companies
Banks (less than 1% of total market share)
Credit Unions

Emerging Market and Business Opportunities
Costs to Remit Money to Latin America
Five years ago the cost was 15% of total amount
Today the average cost is 7.6%
Dual ATM cards or stored value cards offered by banks offer the lowest costs, 1.5%

Emerging Market and Business Opportunities
Remittance Senders Tend to be “Unbanked�
75% of Mexican remitters are unbanked
71% of Honduran remitters are unbanked
38% of Dominican remitters are unbanked
35% of Ecuadorian remitters are unbanked


FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
The New Alliance Task Force (NATF)
Launched in Chicago in May 2003 by the FDIC Community Affairs Program and the Consulate General of Mexico

FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
New Alliance Task Force Mission
Improve access to the U.S. banking system among recent immigrants
Take concrete steps to carry out the Action Plan outlined in the U.S.-Mexico Partnership for Prosperity Agreement

FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
New Alliance Task Force Members – 55
Mexican Consulate
Banks
Community-based Organizations
Federal Regulators
Secondary Market
Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) Companies
FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
New Alliance Task Force Working Groups
Financial Education
Bank Products & Services
Mortgage Product
Social Projects

FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
Financial Education
35,000 immigrants in the Midwest have participated in financial education classes or workshops
The Mexican Consulate of Chicago has launched a pilot program utilizing FDIC’s Money Smart program

FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
Bank Products & Services
50,000 new accounts
$100 million in deposits
Average account balance - $2,000
400,000 new accounts nationwide

FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
Bank Products & Services
Products with remittance features
Wire transfer
Dual ATM cards
Stored-value card

FDIC’s Impact in Chicago
Number of Banks that Offer Products with Remittance Features
Nationwide 48
Midwest 33

The New Alliance Task Force (NATF)
Banks that Accept Alternate Forms of ID
Nationally 118 (19 national banks)
Midwest 86
Chicago 44

The New Alliance Task Force (NATF)

Nationwide Bank Offices That Accept Alternate Forms of ID
9,200 FDIC Insured Banks
88,713 Total Bank Offices
27,976 Accept Matricula Card
32% of total accept

Bi-Partisan Congressional Support
Michael G. Oxley (R-Ohio), Chairman, Committee on Financial Services
Spencer Bachus (R-Alabama), Chairman, Subcommittee on Financial Institutions
U.S. Senator Richard Lugar (R-Indiana)
Ruben Hinojosa (D-Texas), Committee on Financial Services
Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts), Committee on Financial Services
Luis Gutierrez (D-Illinois), Committee on Financial Services

Role of FDIC
Federal Banking Regulations
FDIC is responsible for helping banks comply with federal banking regulations, and not immigration law.

Role of FDIC
USA PATRIOT Act
Section 326 – Customer Identification Program

The final rule requires financial institutions to establish a customer identification program (CIP) for all new accounts, regardless of whether the customer is a U.S. citizen or foreign national, to form a reasonable belief as to the identity of their customers.

Role of FDIC
USA PATRIOT Act (cont’d.)
The final rule distinguishes between a U.S. person and a non-U.S. person. For a non-U.S. person, a bank must obtain:
Social Security Number, Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN), or Employer Identification Number;
Passport number and country of issuance;
Role of FDIC
USA PATRIOT Act (cont’d.)
Alien Identification Card number; or
Number and country of issuance of any other government-issued document evidencing nationality or residence and bearing a photograph or similar safeguard (e.g., Matricula Consular card).
Role of FDIC
USA PATRIOT Act (cont’d.)
The final regulation does not discourage bank acceptance of the “Matricula Consular� identity card that is issued by the Mexican government to immigrants from Mexico.
Treasury encourages financial institutions to obtain an ITIN in lieu of a Social Security Number as part of their account opening procedures.
Bank acceptance of the Matricula card or ITIN does NOT make inference regarding the individual’s immigration status.
Risk to FDIC
Compliance and Safety & Soundness
Minimal risk in banks accepting alternate forms of ID as long as they adhere to and comply with Section 326 of the USA PATRIOT Act.
The risk associated with originating mortgage loans utilizing the ITIN can be mitigated as long as banks comply with Section 326, adopt prudent/sound/flexible underwriting guidelines, and monitor delinquency reports on a regular basis.
Risk to FDIC
Compliance and Safety & Soundness
(cont’d.)
The billions of dollars flowing into the banking system in the form of deposits can have a stabilizing effect on the U.S. banking system.
Denying immigrants banking services would force this population to rely on higher-cost, less-regulated financial service providers, with the resultant loss in regulatory oversight and transparency of Latin American remittances.
Risk to FDIC
Security Issues
Does the Matricula/ITIN compromise U.S. security?
Industry Bank Secrecy Act experts have expressed comfort with the IDs.
Government officials have testified before Congress about the relative ease with which U.S. official documents can be falsified, including Social Security cards.
Risk to FDIC
Security Issues (cont’d.)
The Matricula Consular card has nearly a dozen security features to deter falsification.
The ITIN can “provide law enforcement with important clues in the event of an investigation� and “could be used to link various transactions together.�.

Contact Information
Michael A. Frias
Community Affairs Officer
FDIC, Chicago Region
500 West Monroe Street, Ste. 3200
Chicago, IL 60661
Tel: 312.382.7506
e-mail: mfrias@fdic.gov

I hope everyone responds to this.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/law/jan- ... d_1-6.html

CRUCIAL CARD

JEFFREY KAYE: Each weekday, there are long waits at Mexico's Los Angeles consulate. Mexican citizens, many here illegally, wait to have their documents checked, provide thumbprints, get photographed, then wait some more. As they do, a clerk completes the finished product: laminated consular identification cards.

CLERK: Tanquana Cervantes?

JEFFREY KAYE: The consulate distributes four to five hundred cards a day. Each "matricula consular," as it is known in Spanish, includes the holder's name and address, photograph, birth date and place. Even though the cards are issued by a foreign government, they are increasingly accepted as legitimate ID by public agencies and businesses across the county.

CLAUDIA TORRES (Translated): It's just that so many places ask for identification, and this is the only thing we have to say who we are.

Mexico leads countries in distributing ID cards

JEFFREY KAYE: Several countries issue consular IDs, but Mexican consulates have been the most active in promoting the cards. They have distributed more than a million and a half in the last two years. The matricula consular does not affect anyone's immigrant status, but it does change people's lives, says Alejandra Bologna, an administrator with L.A.'s Mexican consulate.

Alejandra BolognaALEJANDRA BOLOGNA, Los Angeles' Mexican Consulate: It helps people to come out of their anonymity, which they live for years. And the second important thing is that they can save their money in banks -- no more in their houses, under their beds, or with them.

JEFFREY KAYE: Mexican officials candidly acknowledge that the card assists illegal immigrants by providing a document for the undocumented. Consul General Martha Lara argues that acceptance of the cards is a matter of human rights.

MARTHA LARA, Consul General, Mexico: If you need them, and your economy needs them -- and this is not under discussion -- why not give them their rights? You want them to work, but you don't want them to have a bank account?

WorkersJEFFREY KAYE: While Lara and others see the cards as a legitimate way to give millions who labor in the shadows a stake in American society, others view them as an unjust reward to illegal immigrants and a threat to national security. The Bush administration is divided over the issue.

A threat to national security?

ASA HUTCHINSON, Department of Homeland Security: We have very little confidence in the security of the matricula consular card.

JEFFREY KAYE: Asa Hutchinson is undersecretary for border and transportation security at the Department of Homeland Security. He doesn't trust the cards.

Asa HutchinsonASA HUTCHINSON: The issuance of matricula consular cards are not sufficiently monitored by the government of Mexico. Clearly they have a right to issue identification documents to their citizens wherever they are; any country does. But we are disappointed that there's not better controls over those. There's not a central registry that we can check with on a regular basis to verify the identity and the use of those.

JEFFREY KAYE: Similarly, the U.S. Department of Justice and FBI have warned that Mexico's matricula consular poses a criminal and terrorist threat, claiming it is vulnerable to fraud and forgery. But the U.S. Treasury Department has approved the use of the cards, and the State Department has given its tacit approval.

The various positions within the administration should be viewed not as conflicts, but as a search for the proper balance, says Hutchinson.

ASA HUTCHINSON: We want to have adequate security measures out there, which is to be able to regulate the flow of illegal money, to make sure that money flows through the legal channels. So that's a security issue. You balance that with not facilitating the presence of those people who are illegally in the country.

DAVID AYON: I think the matricula is a perfect example of the Bush administration's ambivalence.

JEFFREY KAYE: Political analyst David Ayon says different policies within the administration reflect conflicting desires. Ayon is a research associate at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles who studies Latino politics and U.S.-Mexico relations. He says the Bush administration wants to enforce immigration laws on the one hand, and on the other, to provide millions of working but illegal immigrants more secure lives.

David AyonDAVID AYON: It didn't want to incur the political cost of fighting for some big legalization program, but nevertheless it allowed the Treasury Department to give its OK to the matricula, which allows for people to have a valid ID and open bank accounts and be able to actually interact with police departments without getting hauled in and possibly deported. So in a way, this is why the critics call it a sort of a backdoor form of legalization.

JEFFREY KAYE: The State Department supports the use of the cards for a pragmatic reason: If the U.S. doesn't accept consular IDs from other nations, it might be tough to persuade those countries to recognize the consular IDs the State Department issues to Americans abroad. As for the Treasury Department, with business worth billions of dollars at stake, it decided that financial institutions should have the flexibility to accept the cards or not.

Wells Fargo statementThat ruling came in September, after it solicited comments about the card's security. Financial institutions large and small across the country sent letters urging the department to allow them to accept the cards. Among them, Wells Fargo wrote: "Wells Fargo believes that Mexican nationals contribute to the U.S. in many ways and are entitled to receive banking services."

BRENDA ROSS-DULAN, Wells Fargo: Well, I think our assessment here is really to not look at the legality of that person's status within the country.

JEFFREY KAYE: Brenda Ross-Dulan is a senior vice president of Wells Fargo, the nation's fourth largest financial services company. It is one of about a hundred financial institutions that now accepts the matricula consular. The company is aggressively marketing itself to migrants.

Wells Fargo has opened up more than a quarter of a million accounts to customers using the matricula.

Brenda Ross-DulanBRENDA ROSS-DULAN: In my particular market here in the Los Angeles area, in this particular store where you are, which is the second highest store in terms of opening up accounts with the matricula, just in this market, it has contributed to more than double-digit growth in checking accounts.

Benefits to the economy

JEFFREY KAYE: But checking accounts are not the only reason financial institutions want immigrants as customers. As a recent report put it, "as people move north, money moves south." With some 6 million immigrants from Latin America regularly sending earnings to their native countries, the flow of remittances reached an estimated $30 billion in 2003.

Money transfer signsMoney transfer businesses reap profits through commissions and exchange rates, and the competition to capture the hot remittance market is intense. Wells Fargo customer Veronica Navarro used a matricula consular to open an account which she uses to transfer funds to relatives abroad for a fee of $10 per transaction.

VERONICA NAVARRO: I send money to my parents in Mexico, in Guadalajara. They live there, so I have to send money, like, twice a week ... I mean a month, like every two weeks.

JEFFREY KAYE: For Navarro, a Mexican citizen, opening a bank account also allowed her to establish credit instead of conducting all her transactions in cash, as she once did.

VERONICA NAVARRO: Right now I have the open account, so I can put the money in savings. The money ... so it's ... it's more easy.

Veronica NavarroJEFFREY KAYE: You don't have to have ... you don't have to have all the cash?

VERONICA NAVARRO: No, I don't.

JEFFREY KAYE: The cards have allowed illegal immigrants to enter the financial mainstream, says David Ayon.

DAVID AYON: Now they're looking at the possibility on down the road of possibly even purchasing homes, really settling down, rather than living several families to an apartment or in a garage, always keeping their money in cash, always on the run because if they get stopped for anything at all, they have no valid ID.

JEFFREY KAYE: To what extent does this legitimize or regularize the status of the undocumented?

DAVID AYON: It absolutely does. It provides them the possibility of a far more normal life or a far greater normalized life than they would otherwise have.

JEFFREY KAYE: Not all financial institutions accept the matricula consular. Its reception has also been mixed outside the banking community. Many jurisdictions don't recognize them, but 13 states accept the cards for driver's license applications. And nearly 1,000 municipalities around the country honor the cards -- among them: Santa Ana, Calif.

Santa Ana Santa Ana has the highest number of foreign-born nationals of any major U.S. city except Miami. In Santa Ana, with a matricula consular, a resident can bank, get a library card, pay for utilities, and report a crime. The Santa Ana Police Department accepts the matricula for identification. The city's police chief is Paul Walters.

Legitimate legal identification?


PAUL WALTERS, Police Chief, Santa Ana, Calif.: It doesn't prove whether they're here legally or illegally. It's just to say, "I say I'm John Smith; this ID shows that I am John Smith." We feel reasonably comfortable that that person is who they say they are.

JEFFREY KAYE: But Walters' approach is not shared by many other police departments. In neighboring Riverside County, sheriff's deputies don't honor the cards.

PAT McNAMARA: From a law enforcement standpoint, the IDs are useless.

JEFFREY KAYE: Pat McNamara is president of the Riverside Sheriff's Association, which represents 1,500 deputies.

Pat McNamaraPAT McNAMARA: Common sense dictates, you know, that we not impose on local law enforcement that they accept a form of identification, in legitimate law enforcement context, that cannot be verified. That's pure common sense.

PAUL WALTERS: It's not 100 percent perfect, but this is something that people can get, and you'll feel more comfortable with them versus the criminal. The criminal's not going to go to the consulate and produce birth certificate and all those papers. They're not going to do that.

JEFFREY KAYE: The Mexican government does not maintain a central database for the matricula that U.S. law enforcement agencies can check, but Mexican officials insist the card itself is virtually impossible to forge.

ID cardALEJANDRA BOLOGNA: It has change color, visible. Then, if you have ultraviolet lights, immediately it will show all ... in the cards, some letters. And then we have the codification information that you can just read it with a special decoder.

JEFFREY KAYE: With widespread acceptance of the matricula consular, Latino and civil rights groups are becoming increasingly vocal in pressing for expanded rights for illegal immigrants. The president is reportedly planning to offer an immigration proposal that, in the words of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, would afford illegal immigrants, "some kind of legal status

http://www.washtimes.com/specialreport/ ... -3298r.htm

Special Report: Changes in the cards


By Mary Shaffrey
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

David Hernandez of Equal Access Education talks to the news media about a lawsuit in Federal Court in Alexandria against universities that refuse admission to undocumented immigrants.
MAYA ALLERUZZO (THE WASHINGTON TIMES)

The Internal Revenue Service this month will begin revising how it distributes Individual Taxpayer Identification Number cards (ITIN) to keep illegal immigrants from using them for fraudulent purposes.
More than 6 million ITIN cards have been issued since 1996, but only 2 million tax forms have been filed using the ITINs. The status of the other 4 million ITINs is not known, but immigration-reform advocates say illegal immigrants are using the numbers to skirt U.S. immigration, tax and fraud laws.
"The ITIN creates two problems: one for national security and one for identity theft," said a government source familiar with the cards. "The IRS is well aware of the problems and is going to be taking steps to correct it."
The federal government's overhaul of its ITIN distribution system coincides with an increase in activity among the states to monitor and verify identification documents to stem the impact of illegal immigration on their communities.
Ordinarily, states concern themselves with issues involving residency, not citizenship, which is a federal concern. But this year alone, initiatives requiring illegal immigrants to pay out-of-state tuition and requiring proof of legal residence for driver's license applications have sprung up in Virginia, Mississippi, Georgia, Massachusetts and other states.
The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that between 8 million and 9 million illegal immigrants reside in the United States.
Earlier this year, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), an independent nonprofit research group specializing in immigration matters, released a report estimating that more than 800,000 illegal immigrants have entered the country each year since the late 1990s.
It is not known how many illegal immigrants are using ITIN cards.
"The IRS, unfortunately, hands these cards out like candy," said Rep. Tom Tancredo, Colorado Republican, a leading advocate for stricter immigration laws. "There are not 6 million foreign businesses here, so what's the purpose of these numbers? They are being used for a lot of reasons, oftentimes for the purpose of obtaining benefits ... and they make life easier for those people looking for ways around the system."
Judith E. Golub, with the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said illegal immigrants "could use [an ITIN] or a fake Social Security number to get a job because an employer can ask only so many questions."
The ITIN is a tax-processing number the IRS issues to "individuals who are required to have a taxpayer identification number, but do not have and are not eligible to obtain a Social Security Number (SSN) issued by the Social Security Administration," according to the IRS' website.
The ITIN resembles the nine-digit Social Security number, but begins with the number 9. The original purpose of the ITIN was to allow foreign nationals who have business interests in the United States, but who do not reside here, to pay taxes on their income.
"It is assumed that individuals who receive an ITIN and do not file taxes are using it as official U.S. government identification to obtain bank accounts, government services and, ominously, driver's licenses," CIS fellow Marti Dinerstein told the House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration in June.
The government source said the IRS has become aware of this trend and has heard many "anecdotal stories" of illegal aliens using ITINs for purposes other than that for which they were originally intended. The source said the eventual changes will be "comprehensive ... polarizing [and] political," but said the changes are needed.
The IRS will work with various agencies to receive information and opinions on the changes and will begin an education campaign to alert employers and immigrants of the changes. The government source said changing the cards had been considered for some time, but it became a prominent concern after September 11.
Virginia has tightened its controls on identification documents after it was revealed that some of the terrorists who crashed a jetliner into the Pentagon had fraudulently obtained driver's licenses and other forms of identification. Beginning Jan. 1, all new applicants for a driver's license must prove they are legally in the state.
Currently, New Jersey, South Dakota and the District require a Social Security card as a form of government-issued identification when new drivers apply for licenses.
Six states â€â€