Live Oak Bank

On Monday, May 14th I entered the required information into Live Oak Banks website to connect to an external commercial bank account to move money to. On Tuesday, May 15th I received a message from Live Oak Bank that the two micro deposits were made to the external account.

I logged into my Live Oak Bank account and proceeded to correctly verify the micro deposit amounts. After successfully verifying the micro deposits a pop-up window stated "Your external account is pending verification. Need to make a transfer right away? "For immediate assistance verifying your account, you may contact us at..." I immediately called Live Oak Bank and spoke with Chris H on the customer success team.

He verified all my information and told me that I needed to provide a bank statement to finish linking to the external account and accessing the funds I have deposited in my Live Oak Bank savings account. I explained that UMB Health Saving Bank which I was trying to link to is a correspondent bank utilized by Interactive Brokers to receive wire transfers and ACH deposits on behalf of their customers and that it was impossible to provide the requested bank statement. Utilizing correspondent banks is common practice for brokerage firms that do not own federally chartered commercial banks. Chris H.

said Live Oak Bank was not willing to link to the verified UMB Health Saving Bank account unless I provided a bank statement. I proceeded to talk to Jennifer O., customer success supervisor, and was told the same thing. I then proceeded to talk to Chelsea R., deposit customer success manager, and was again told the same thing. I asked both Jennifer O.

and Chelsea R. why the external account link was being denied even though I completed all the requisite verifications and under what banking law they were denying me access to my funds, their answers were "its internal policy," "we can deny external links at our sole discretion for any reason," and that "we are not setup to send funds to brokerage accounts." I once again explained, and they both acknowledged that the funds were being sent to a federally chartered, FDIC insured commercial bank, and was again told that Live Oak Bank would not link the account without a UMB Health Savings Bank statement. I then asked Chelsea R.

to connect me with her supervisor and she refused to provide her supervisor's name or to connect me with anyone stating, "they are not in the office at the moment, and I need to see who is available to call you back." I asked where in Live Oak Bank's customer account opening application or on its website does it state that customers cannot link to external correspondent commercial banks to access their funds and she admitted neither the application or the website provides this information and that "it is internal policy that we are not required to disclose." This is completely outrageous and deceptive. I have never had a bank refuse to link a verified external commercial bank account and deny me access to my own money.