Chase account getting locked and transfers rejected. What to do / tips to keep it from happening?

[MCST]

I switched over to Chase for personal and business checking. Also opened a brokerage to qualify for Sapphire level checking.

I'm starting to wonder if I made a mistake. My account has been locked 4 times in the past 24 hours. Every single transfer gets rejected, in or out. I can't even transfer money between Chase checking and Chase brokerage without it getting flagged, rejected, and resulting in a full account lock. Each time I have to call Chase, go through a verification process, and they unlock it. Their answer is to keep trying transfers and eventually they won't get flagged.



For those with Chase, is this par for the course, or does it get better as the account ages?

Any tips on how to avoid this (short of not using the account) would be appreciated. I may just chalk it up to a learning experience and ditch Chase entirely. Everyone I worked with in the branch was excellent, but it's ridiculous not to be able to use a checking account as it was intended.

[mrmass]

While I don't use chase for that, do institutions that you're transferring to/from have the exact same registratio? (names)

[MCST]

While I don't use chase for that, do institutions that you're transferring to/from have the exact same registratio? (names)

They do. I'd get it if it were moving money in and out quickly to different institutions, but this is happening with Chase to Chase internal transfers from checking to brokerage, both with the same registration. They flag it, reject the transfer, and lock my account. All the reps can tell me is that sometimes the system flags suspicious transactions to protect customers accounts.

I just don't want to keep trying and end up getting shut down permanently and having the money in there locked up longer (as I've read about with the previous Chase shutdowns).

[angelescrest]

That’s odd. My transfers from Chase to my online bank are the fastest of any of the institutions I bank with. I have only been with them for a few years and hold a small amount of funds in savings.

[TG2]

I do transfers between Chase accounts, automatic payments for credit cards, set up outside payments, send money to my brokerage account, and send payments through Zelle both as single payments and repeating ones. Have never had an issue with any of them.

[djshackesq]

I left Chase for this exact reason. Unfortunately it seems pretty common with Chase.

[stan1]

More details might help. How long have the account been open? What is the dollar value of the transfers?

Chase recently had some fraud incidents, and my guess is they have reacted by becoming very restrictive about locking down transfers. There are reports of multiple brokerages adding undisclosed holds and restrictions to deter fraud.

For now, I don't think people should assume they will be able to do spontaneous transfers like they have in the past at any financial institution. Plan ahead.

[MCST]

More details might help. How long have the account been open? What is the dollar value of the transfers?

Chase recently had some fraud incidents, and my guess is they have reacted by becoming very restrictive about locking down transfers. There are reports of multiple brokerages adding undisclosed holds and restrictions to deter fraud.

For now, I don't think people should assume they will be able to do spontaneous transfers like they have in the past at any financial institution. Plan ahead.

Accounts were opened within the last week. I initially tried to do a partial ACATS transfer from Merrill. Rejected because Chase didn't like the signature. Then I wired 6 figures of cash in. That went fine, but the issues started when I tried to fund the Chase brokerage. I tried a couple times to fund the brokerage. First time was rejected and account was locked. Then it was after market hours so I couldn't transfer. Tried again this morning, and same issue. I tried 100k, 75k and even 50k. All of them are resulting in a flag and lock.

I don't know how Chase expects you to fund a new account if it rejects every attempt to transfer funds or securities in.

Totally understandable if I was depositing checks and wiring money all over, but I'm literally just trying to fund a new account.

[RetiredAL]

More details might help. How long have the account been open? What is the dollar value of the transfers?

Chase recently had some fraud incidents, and my guess is they have reacted by becoming very restrictive about locking down transfers. There are reports of multiple brokerages adding undisclosed holds and restrictions to deter fraud.

For now, I don't think people should assume they will be able to do spontaneous transfers like they have in the past at any financial institution. Plan ahead.

Accounts were opened within the last week. I initially tried to do a partial ACATS transfer from Merrill. Rejected because Chase didn't like the signature. Then I wired 6 figures of cash in. That went fine, but the issues started when I tried to fund the Chase brokerage. I tried a couple times to fund the brokerage. First time was rejected and account was locked. Then it was after market hours so I couldn't transfer. Tried again this morning, and same issue. I tried 100k, 75k and even 50k. All of them are resulting in a flag and lock.

I don't know how Chase expects you to fund a new account if it rejects every attempt to transfer funds or securities in.

Totally understandable if I was depositing checks and wiring money all over, but I'm literally just trying to fund a new account.

"Accounts were opened within the last week." This! Having new money posted to your account does not mean that it is settled money within the bank's systems. Unfortunately, their bank system considers the transfer to their brokerage as a transfer out, and suspicious, hence they block it.

[stan1]

Accounts were opened within the last week.
....
I tried 100k, 75k and even 50k. All of them are resulting in a flag and lock.

Ah, there you go. Large amount in new accounts fraud trigger. Stop what you are doing, you are making it worse if you keep trying. First let it settle for a week. Then one thing at a time. Separate out ACH and ACATS. Try $500 ACH push from B of A checking to Chase checking (FDIC bank accounts) to start (that's five hundred not five hundred thousand).

[MCST]

Thanks. I'll wait a week and reevaluate. I thought if I wired funds in to Chase they would be considered settled since it's irreversible. I also didn't know that Chase considers transfers from checking to brokerage an external transfer, so that's good to know! I guess I was a little too aggressive trying to move over and get things set up.

Hopefully I haven't upset the Chase AI bots too much.

[CashConfessions]

Totally understandable if I was depositing checks and wiring money all over, but I'm literally just trying to fund a new account.

I had the same experience with Chase. They really didn't like using their system to initiate a pull from another bank, but they would accept an ACH push of funds.

That said, I was annoyed that their offshore support just blatantly made up technical excuses--rather than just acknowledging Chase policy was to blame--and I closed the accounts shortly after opening bonuses posted. At least the in-person banker was friendly and apologized for the inconvenience.

[jebmke]

More details might help. How long have the account been open? What is the dollar value of the transfers?

Chase recently had some fraud incidents, and my guess is they have reacted by becoming very restrictive about locking down transfers. There are reports of multiple brokerages adding undisclosed holds and restrictions to deter fraud.

For now, I don't think people should assume they will be able to do spontaneous transfers like they have in the past at any financial institution. Plan ahead.

Accounts were opened within the last week. I initially tried to do a partial ACATS transfer from Merrill. Rejected because Chase didn't like the signature. Then I wired 6 figures of cash in. That went fine, but the issues started when I tried to fund the Chase brokerage. I tried a couple times to fund the brokerage. First time was rejected and account was locked. Then it was after market hours so I couldn't transfer. Tried again this morning, and same issue. I tried 100k, 75k and even 50k. All of them are resulting in a flag and lock.

I don't know how Chase expects you to fund a new account if it rejects every attempt to transfer funds or securities in.

Totally understandable if I was depositing checks and wiring money all over, but I'm literally just trying to fund a new account.

"Accounts were opened within the last week." This! Having new money posted to your account does not mean that it is settled money within the bank's systems. Unfortunately, their bank system considers the transfer to their brokerage as a transfer out, and suspicious, hence they block it.

Agree; sounds like the standard anti-money laundering immune system.

[vtftw100]

This is pretty normal OP. I assume you opened your accounts in-person at a Chase branch? People have reported permanent account closures when they've tried transacting large (or even small) dollar amounts into/out of new accounts they opened online. And it's not just Chase, most banks act this way. They want you to use the account in a relatively natural way when its new i.e. receive deposits and make payments, not do a whole lot of transfer activity since that is a sure shot indica of fraud.

It will hopefully get better as the account ages. Takes a while for them to build a risk profile on you (e.g. expected amount you hold/move, # of times you overdraft etc).

[MCST]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions.

Has anyone with an older account still had issues with Chase allowing money movement? I'm hoping this stops as the account ages, but it makes me nervous that Chase is a good long-term solution. I don't want to be in a position where most of our cash is at Chase/JPM and it gets locked up by their fraud algorithms constantly (or permanently).

Also - when did JP Morgan start restricting transfers to/fr the brokerage account to market hours? That is extremely odd and a bit frustrating. I typically do my banking in the evening or weekends and I'm not sure what the point is of restricting transfers like that. Appears to be a bank/brokerage wide policy and not a new account policy.

[djshackesq]

I had these issues with an account open over a year. At one point they locked my online access because of a $100 transfer from my Chase checking account to my Chase brokerage account. I just got really really tired of calling their offshore fraud department almost daily.

[scottjspencer]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions.

Has anyone with an older account still had issues with Chase allowing money movement? I'm hoping this stops as the account ages, but it makes me nervous that Chase is a good long-term solution. I don't want to be in a position where most of our cash is at Chase/JPM and it gets locked up by their fraud algorithms constantly (or permanently).

Also - when did JP Morgan start restricting transfers to/fr the brokerage account to market hours? That is extremely odd and a bit frustrating. I typically do my banking in the evening or weekends and I'm not sure what the point is of restricting transfers like that. Appears to be a bank/brokerage wide policy and not a new account policy.

I opened an account a few years ago, and recently had a problem. They flagged a transfer in from my credit union. I missed the call from the fraud department, and they rejected it. But I called the number in the voice mail, and was told that they had left a note, and to retry it. Even if the fraud department flagged it again, they should see the note and approve it. Instead, it was rejected without me even getting a call.

So I called them back and closed the account instead. It's just not worth the hassle.

[gavinsiu]

Check your phone and also contact Chase. Chase sometimes will send out a text to verify. For example, I attempt to withdraw an unusually large amount of money from the ATM. New accounts are also flagged more often. I immediately got a text asking if I did this. I attempted to hit yes, but hit the wrong button and my ATM card was immediately cancelled. You can also run into issue if you deposit some money and then immediately withdraw it before it settled. Recently there was a few tik tok video instruction viewers to do just deposite a fake check and then withdraw the money, causing Chase to be more proactive in locking accounts.

[exodusNH]

Also - when did JP Morgan start restricting transfers to/fr the brokerage account to market hours? That is extremely odd and a bit frustrating. I typically do my banking in the evening or weekends and I'm not sure what the point is of restricting transfers like that. Appears to be a bank/brokerage wide policy and not a new account policy.

My hypothesis is that they were seeing fraudulent transactions occuring during off hours. Since people are less likely to see notifications in the middle of the night and on weekends.

[MCST]

So I called them back and closed the account instead. It's just not worth the hassle.

That's what I'm going to do. On the one hand, I get it. They want to prevent fraud, but there has to be a better way. Every transaction requires a call with some overseas call center to go through "public records" challenge questions and an interrogation about why I'm sending the money and the account I'm sending it to. Makes the free wire transfers sort of worthless...

[techbud]

I have a chase checking account (15+ years old) and a newish chase brokerage account (opened July 23).
I've had zero problems moving money between the two.

I did have one problem in Oct 23 (so the account would have been 3 months old) where I tried to do a $20K EFT out of the brokerage and into a different checking account (Cap1), and they locked my brokerage account. A phone call cleared it up, but since then I've stopped doing transfers directly from the brokerage; if I need to move money in or out to an external institution, I do it through my checking and then do an internal transfer to/from the brokerage.

[vtftw100]

Extremely typical of Chase. Folks over in the churning & DoC community are very familiar with this stuff. This is so pervasive they have page dedicated to telling people not to initiate money transfers from Chase — https://www.doctorofcredit.com/psa-dont ... nt-lockup/.

It’s ofc incredibly dumb for a bank to be this finicky about….money movement..but here we are. Chase absolutely hates being the originator of ACH transactions on their consumer accounts.

[techbud]

Extremely typical of Chase. Folks over in the churning & DoC community are very familiar with this stuff. This is so pervasive they have page dedicated to telling people not to initiate money transfers from Chase — https://www.doctorofcredit.com/psa-dont ... nt-lockup/.

It’s ofc incredibly dumb for a bank to be this finicky about….money movement..but here we are. Chase absolutely hates being the originator of ACH transactions on their consumer accounts.

Those caveats seem to only apply to churners/bonus chasers with very young accounts. As I commented in the post right above yours, in 15+ years of having a chase checking account , I have *never* had a problem moving money in or out, often moving five figures at a time.

[VictorStarr]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions.

Has anyone with an older account still had issues with Chase allowing money movement? I'm hoping this stops as the account ages, but it makes me nervous that Chase is a good long-term solution. I don't want to be in a position where most of our cash is at Chase/JPM and it gets locked up by their fraud algorithms constantly (or permanently).

Also - when did JP Morgan start restricting transfers to/fr the brokerage account to market hours? That is extremely odd and a bit frustrating. I typically do my banking in the evening or weekends and I'm not sure what the point is of restricting transfers like that. Appears to be a bank/brokerage wide policy and not a new account policy.

In the last five years I opened multiple deposit and brokerage accounts and moved hundreds of thousands to/from Chase. I checked my records:
- Opened 8 deposit accounts and closed 6.
- Opened 5 brokerage accounts and closed 4.
- Opened 6 credit cards and closed 2.
- Transferred up to $250K (a month after opening a new account).
- Collected multiple checking/savings, Chase Private Client, JP Morgan Brokerage bonuses.
Despite multiple new accounts, and typical churning patterns I never experienced any lockups or restrictions.

To decrease probability of account lock ups I followed a few simple rules:
- Minimize any activity for the first 30 days after opening an account.
- Use wires or ACH push to transfer money in/out deposit accounts.
- Use ACATS to move investments in/out deposit accounts.

Your mistake was to use your checking and brokerage right after opening. Start slow and take some time to migrate your activity to a new account.

[MadHungarian]

Ah yes, with Chase you have to move slowly and gradually, to get their automated fraud-detection system comfortable with you. And naturally a brand-new account with lots of activity and transfers will send their fraud-detection system into a nervous tizzy. It starts locking all sort of functions and inserting manual wait-states. You can't move fast with them.

I don't use Chase myself anymore (only reason i did so in the past was because elderly parents had their account there).
But if you do want to use them, establish your new account a month or two ahead of time, wait awhile, then start slowly adding new behavior. Especially with transfers, you need to move slowly and build up the confidence of that paranoid automated fraud-detection system.

It's probably largely the same with just about anyone these days. Brand-new accounts are on probation for awhile, until the bank gets to know you better.

[NYCaviator]

Your mistake was to use your checking and brokerage right after opening. Start slow and take some time to migrate your activity to a new account.

I'm sure you are correct, but it's insane to think that a customer shouldn't be able to use an account for a certain period of time after they open it.

If the banks are that concerned about fraud, either stop offering consumer accounts or lower transfer limits for the first 30 days. But if they are going to restrict transfers and make it impossible for people to get money in and out, they should - at a minimum - tell people up front so they can be prepared. (... looking at you Fidelity).

In OP's case, they can't even transfer from checking to brokerage... at the same bank! That's mind boggling, and I don't see how that would prevent fraud.

[NYCaviator]

Also - when did JP Morgan start restricting transfers to/fr the brokerage account to market hours? That is extremely odd and a bit frustrating. I typically do my banking in the evening or weekends and I'm not sure what the point is of restricting transfers like that. Appears to be a bank/brokerage wide policy and not a new account policy.

My hypothesis is that they were seeing fraudulent transactions occuring during off hours. Since people are less likely to see notifications in the middle of the night and on weekends.

It still doesn't make sense to me. From OP's original post, they are transferring from a Chase checking to a Chase brokerage. How would restricting these transfers to market hours prevent fraud? Is Chase going to start restricting transfers from Chase checking to Chase savings to banker's hours too?

It seems like a weird, arbitrary policy by the bank. I wonder if it's temporary or permanent?

[techbud]

Also - when did JP Morgan start restricting transfers to/fr the brokerage account to market hours? That is extremely odd and a bit frustrating. I typically do my banking in the evening or weekends and I'm not sure what the point is of restricting transfers like that. Appears to be a bank/brokerage wide policy and not a new account policy.

My hypothesis is that they were seeing fraudulent transactions occuring during off hours. Since people are less likely to see notifications in the middle of the night and on weekends.

It’s been like this as long as I’ve had a brokerage account with them (1.5 years)

[NYCaviator]

My hypothesis is that they were seeing fraudulent transactions occuring during off hours. Since people are less likely to see notifications in the middle of the night and on weekends.

It’s been like this as long as I’ve had a brokerage account with them (1.5 years)

That's crazy to me. So you wait a day for the MMF to settle. And then you probably have to wait another day to transfer it out. Seems like a lot of extra steps/time for something that should be simpler. It doesn't make a lot of sense to restrict transfers to trading hours.

[chinchin]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Chase lets you schedule brokerage transfers 24/7, but it will only execute during banker's hours. Which in my experience is the same everywhere.

[ScubaHogg]

"Accounts were opened within the last week." This! Having new money posted to your account does not mean that it is settled money within the bank's systems. Unfortunately, their bank system considers the transfer to their brokerage as a transfer out, and suspicious, hence they block it.

It’s a real shame they don’t just publish the restrictions for new accounts. Instead normal people are left having to make guesses as to what the secret rules and secret punishments are

[rudeboyrg]

I'm having similar issues with Chase business checking.
Had it for 6 months. Want to pull cash into account from my linked personal checking account. I can push no problem. When I pull, it gets rejected within 20 minutes and my linked account is removed. I was able to pull 1,000 after like 10 days of hold (ridiculouis). But 40,000 I can't pull even though chase offers 100,000 /day transfer limit. I can't push that kind of money from my linked account because it's a personal account that has lower push limit. One of the nice features advertised by chase business is that I can pull in up to 100K if I need to. They barely let me pull in anything, reject for fraud, and remove linked bank. Never seen any other bank do this. Everybody is complaining about Chase but nobody is offering alternative banks for business checking. Is someone able to suggest a better bank for a business account as an alternative?

[NYCaviator]

I just got hit with this. I tried to make an internal transfer from a business to a personal account and Chase placed it “under review.” I called their customer service and was told they are closed and to call during business hours, though they never said what those hours are and it’s nowhere online.

I like that Chase has good security, but this is very annoying. Has anyone found a solution to not upset the Chase fraud algorithms?