Barriers to Building Financial Security for Survivors of Domestic Violence
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Barriers to Building Financial Security for Survivors of Domestic Violence Prepared for The Financial Clinic By Claire Boyce Sara Koliner Lacee Koplin Shuangyi (Issy) Sun Dan Trifone Joann Wong Workshop in Public Affairs Spring 2014 ©2014 Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System All rights reserved. For additional copies: Publications Office La Follette School of Public Affairs 1225 Observatory Drive, Madison, WI 53706 www.lafollette.wisc.edu/publications/workshops.html [email protected] The Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs is a teaching and research department of the University of Wisconsin–Madison. The school takes no stand on policy issues; opinions expressed in these pages reflect the views of the authors. Table of Contents List of Figures .......................................................................................................... v Foreword ............................................................................................................... vi Acknowledgments ................................................................................................. vii Executive Summary .............................................................................................. viii Barriers to Financial Accounts .......................................................................................... viii Policy and Program Opportunities ................................................................................. viii Next Steps for the Financial Clinic ..................................................................................... ix Introduction ............................................................................................................... 1 Types of Economic Abuse .................................................................................................... 1 Coercion ................................................................................................................ 1 Identity Theft ............................................................................................................. 3 Financial Service Barriers Caused by Economic Abuse ...................................................... 3 The Financial Services Landscape .......................................................................... 5 Types of Personal Financial Accounts ................................................................................. 5 Savings Accounts ........................................................................................................ 5 Checking Accounts ..................................................................................................... 6 Joint Accounts ......................................................................................................... 6 Convenience Accounts ..................................................................................................... 6 The Financially Underserved Market ................................................................................ 7 Regulatory Agencies ............................................................................................................ 9 Closing a Joint Bank Account ............................................................................... 11 Joint Bank Account Closure Process ................................................................................. 11 Step 1: Placing Request for Closure ......................................................................... 11 Step 2: Accepting Request for Closure .................................................................... 12 Step 3: Balancing and Closing Accounts ........................................................................ 12 Barriers to Closing Joint Bank Accounts ..................................................................... 12 Delinquent Accounts ...................................................................................................... 12 No Access to Remaining Funds ...................................................................................... 12 “Zombie” Accounts ........................................................................................................ 13 Opening a Financial Account ................................................................................ 14 Account Opening Requirements ....................................................................................... 14 Barriers to Opening Bank Accounts .................................................................................. 15 Address Verification ..................................................................................................... 15 Account Mishandling Verification Services ................................................................... 15 Policy and Program Opportunities ....................................................................... 17 Customer Due Diligence Program Guidelines ................................................................. 17 Address Confidentiality Programs .................................................................................... 18 Second Chance Accounts ................................................................................................... 19 Partnerships with Financial Institutions ........................................................................... 20 Next Steps for The Financial Clinic ....................................................................... 21 Support and Initiate Financial Institution Partnerships .................................................. 21 Develop an Enhanced Financial Abuse Intervention Toolkit ........................................... 21 Commission a Comprehensive Survey on the Effects of Financial Abuse ...................... 23 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 25 Appendix A: Analysis Scope and Methodology .................................................. 26 Analysis Scope ............................................................................................................. 26 Methodology ............................................................................................................... 26 Appendix B: Joint Financial Account Regulatory Rules ...................................... 28 Appendix C: Bank Secrecy Act Section 103.121 .................................................. 29 Appendix D: USA PATRIOT Act sections 326, 351 and 356 ................................. 35 USA PATRIOT Act of 2001, Section 326, subsection (a) ............................................. 35 USA PATRIOT Act of 2001, Section 351 ...................................................................... 36 Appendix E: FinCEN Ruling FIN‐‐‐2009‐‐‐R2003 .......................................................... 39 Appendix F: Details of the NYC SafeStart Account ............................................. 41 Appendix G: Scale of Economic Abuse ................................................................ 45 References ............................................................................................................ 46 List of Figures Figure 1. Types of personal financial accounts ....................................................... 5 Figure 2. Financial account closure process .......................................................... 11 5 Foreword This report is the result of collaboration between the Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and The Financial Clinic. The School’s objective is to provide graduate students at La Follette the opportunity to improve their policy analysis skills while contributing to the capacity of partner organizations. The La Follette School offers a two-year graduate program leading to a master’s degree in public affairs. Students study policy analysis and public management, and they can choose to pursue a concentration in a policy focus area. They spend the first year and a half of the program taking courses in which they develop the expertise needed to analyze public policies. The authors of this report are all in their final semester of their degree program and are enrolled in Public Affairs 869 Workshop in Public Affairs. Although acquiring a set of policy analysis skills is important, there is no substitute for doing policy analysis as a means of learning policy analysis. Public Affairs 869 gives graduate students that opportunity. I am grateful to The Financial Clinic for partnering with the La Follette School on this project. This report provides a review of the critical financial issues facing survivors of domestic abuse and then reviews an array of institutional and policy responses that The Financial Clinic should consider to improve the economic wellbeing of vulnerable individuals. The barriers to financial access for survivors are relatively understudied, and the policy and programmatic options are not widely discussed in public affairs currently. Yet, as the authors describe, being able to access financial services is a critical issue for victims of domestic abuse and the professionals serving these individuals. The report provides a succinct review of the context of domestic violence in relation to financial access, and offers a number of evidence-based insights that should be illustrative to the broader financial capability field. All of the solutions proposed involve engagement with partners from