Most of us have probably by now heard at least something of the troubles that the victims of these latest storms have had in trying to cash checks or do banking when their banks were destroyed or at least with out power for extended period of time.

I think that something I have done for years might help during a crisis like this. I kept my account that I used as a student when I first went to college.

It’s in a teacher’s credit union that allowed student workers to have accounts along with the teachers and other university employees. It is many hours from anywhere I have lived since I left there and would not likely be struck by the same catastrophe that hit where I choose to live.

I have always on moving had new checks printed with my current address and have never had any trouble using them anywhere I went. I normally keep my emergency fund in this account anyway as well as the occasional car loan etc. and so would have something to fall back on that is physically so far removed from me that it is likely to still be there if my area gets hit. Also thanks to the speed of Internet banking I could with a few minutes to spare send anything and everything from my local bank to my credit union before the clouds of doom descended on my fair city.

Just a thought for you to bounce around and see what you think!

What happens when the city your bank is in is destroyed?

Kinda like moving because most accidents happen within 10 miles of your house.

I would imagine banking with a bigger bank, such as Bank of America, with locations in multiple states would be best since they are likely to have better, multistate backup systems etc.

Accounts in national and local banks are both good ideas -- with ID you can access your acount from a diffrent city.

ONE plan:

Cash on hand
debit card/ checks
credit card with good limit
money in national account

This is not a commercial plug, but merely reality: you cash a check most anywhere at a hotel with an American Express card, not to mention an AmEx office.

Also, in these times of misplaced persons, if you have a family member that checks into a hotel with their card, AmEx has the capacity to deliver a message to them to contact you.

Living in the FL Keys, I thought about the senerio of a Cat 5 hurricane moving right up this string of islands. All of our accounts are with community banks. I asked a teller about account access if I evac. The best she could come up with is to use our ATM card.
I keep $5000.00 in cash for just such emergencies and have had to send my wife and daughters out of here twice this season. Sure is easier to convince them to go if I hand them an envelope with a couple grand in it.
This week I will be moving our savings account to a Bank of America account.

I did something very similiar. I joined a credit union in the midwest years before moving to Florida. I kept the account. Finally established a new account with another credit union, local this time. I keep most of my cash savings with ING Direct. Using the ING account, I can tranfer money between it and either credit union account. If one doesn't work, I'm hoping the other one will.

Must be nice to have that much cash on hand -- I can't imagine having 5 grand. At best, I can manage a couple hundred for emergencies and that's it.

It's nice but probably not necessary for most situations. I think the point is that, in most disaster scenarios, stores probably won't be able to take credit cards, and if you've traveled out of your local area, checks may not be accepted either. Seems like more and more people have less and less cash on hand. These same people will be in for a nasty surprise when the power goes out. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

In my experience, if you have more than $20, you're better prepared than the person who uses a debit card to pay for a $5 drive through order.

No phone lines = no credit card transactions, no debit card transactions. Some store cash register systems are on computers, so no power no credit/debit purchases.

I have paid in cash for purchases tallied by the cashier with a calculator ( taxes etc…) when the power was out. Many stores will not handle credit card transactions manually (remember the kchick-kchick machines ?) because of widespread fraud.

Cash is best – is my policy. Besides you can’t bribe anyone with a credit/debit card :-))

Maybe I did not flesh this out enough to let every one know what I was talking about. The people of south Louisiana have traveled north to escape the storm to places that have all the amenities we are use to in modern America but with their bank destroyed they still can’t do any banking because all their records and banks computers are gone. Its not a matter of not being able to bank because of a power outage its that the bank and all its branches are gone. Yea cash is king and always will be but there are bills to be paid checks to be written life must go on and that is greatly simplified by having more than one account that is physically separated from each other by a substantial distance.
To show you another example of computers being lost during the storm it is my understanding that there are new cars being driven all around the country right now with New Orleans dealers tags on them that still come up clean when you run the VIN on them because there is no one to report them and no computer to log them its all just gone. If Uncle Sugar can’t keep track of stolen cars right now we can hardly expect anyone to worry about your lost bank records or your needing to cash a check or do some banking.