Medallion signature for opening treasury direct account

[s0198362]

I decided this year to explore a treasury direct account for I series bonds.  Too late for the april buy cutoff.  Never mind.  To use my account treasury direct needs a medallion signature guarantee.  I went to my chase beach but they only do it for transferring assessors (or something like that) not verifying identity, even for existing customers.

I’m kind of stuck.  Does anyone have any tips?  The only other local brick and mortar bank i bank with is BoA.  The rest are all online (or not local).

Thanks in advance

[HPstache]

I decided this year to explore a treasury direct account for I series bonds.  Too late for the april buy cutoff.  Never mind.  To use my account treasury direct needs a medallion signature guarantee.  I went to my chase beach but they only do it for transferring assessors (or something like that) not verifying identity, even for existing customers.

I’m kind of stuck.  Does anyone have any tips?  The only other local brick and mortar bank i bank with is BoA.  The rest are all online (or not local).

Thanks in advance

A what?  I have heard of people having to jump thru weird hoops for TreasuryDirect, but it literally took me 20 minutes and nothing at all like that to set up my account.

[Adventine]

I decided this year to explore a treasury direct account for I series bonds.  Too late for the april buy cutoff.  Never mind.  To use my account treasury direct needs a medallion signature guarantee.  I went to my chase beach but they only do it for transferring assessors (or something like that) not verifying identity, even for existing customers.

I’m kind of stuck.  Does anyone have any tips?  The only other local brick and mortar bank i bank with is BoA.  The rest are all online (or not local).

Thanks in advance

A what?  I have heard of people having to jump thru weird hoops for TreasuryDirect, but it literally took me 20 minutes and nothing at all like that to set up my account.

I'm another of those people who couldn't complete my Treasury Direct account creation online. I needed a medallion signature too. My husband, on the other hand, opened his account without any issues. The main difference between us is that he is a US citizen by birth and lived most of his life in the States, while I'm a green card holder who's only lived in the States for a year.



Here's the email I got from Treasury Direct:


Dear Account Holder,

Thanks again for opening a TreasuryDirect account.  We are having difficulty verifying the information you provided when opening your account.  We are not provided with any information related to issues with the account verification.  The online application process is automated and the TreasuryDirect system attempts to verify information the customer provides with commercially available services.  Only a Pass/Fail notification is returned to the TreasuryDirect system.  The verification process does not involve your banking information or data from your credit report/rating.  We cannot answer questions via phone calls or emails related to this topic.

For your protection and to help resolve any access issues with your account, please complete the account authorization form https://www.treasurydirect.gov/pdf/rs/acctauth.pdf and mail it to Treasury Retail Securities Site, P.O. Box 7015, Minneapolis, MN 55480-7015.



To answer OP's question, I got the medallion stamp for free at our local bank. If BoA won't do it for you, maybe a smaller local bank or credit union will.

[dandarc]

About the only reason we haven't left our increasingly less local bank yet - they provide that mediallion stamp for customers.

Stupid archaic process, and real annoying if you like to clear stuff that you've decided to do quickly, but ultimately not that difficult if your bank offers the service.

[Morning Glory]

I needed the medallion too because I moved and not gotten around to updating my driver's license yet, so the addresses didn't match. My credit union could have done it but I got busy and never completed the account setup process and now I've moved again and might want to buy a house in the next year so my cash is still in a savings account. Punch me in the face.

[travel2020]

Had the same issue when I tried to update my account info earlier this year.

I bank with BoA and they were able to take care of it. Not all branches handle it though. You can find and schedule appointments using their website (I think after you login) and choose medallion guarantee - or something along those lines -  from the list of options the form gives you. In my case, it was a branch not too far away that had a local Merrill person who took care of it.

[nalor511]

Even though the form says not to, just get a notary stamp and include a letter saying you could not obtain the medallion, but you tried. They will accept it

[rab-bit]

I have no idea about how legit this is, but a respected Bogleheads member pointed out the possibility of getting this online for a fee: https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=6642630#p6642630

[cool7hand]

We also needed a medallion signature. Our advisor at Schwab has helped us by shepherding the paperwork via Schwab's robust back office. It's taking time because of Uncle Sam, but it's all free.

[MoseyingAlong]

I'm on hold with Treasury Direct and want to vent somewhere.

I called an hour and 20 minutes ago, the recording said my wait would be about an hour and a half.
About 30 minutes ago, it said an hour and 15 for an iteration of the recording.
Now it's back to an hour and a half. So I haven't moved anywhere in the projected wait time.  Arghhhh

ETA. It was answered right around 1.5 hours after I called even though the recording was still saying an hour and a half. And the agent was very thorough and quick in solving my problem. Nice job, Treasury Direct!

[tawyer]

Wells Fargo did it for free. Took a couple of trips to find the one person in the one branch that could do it. TD account was approved a few days after I mailed the form in.

[cool7hand]

I'm on hold with Treasury Direct and want to vent somewhere.

I called an hour and 20 minutes ago, the recording said my wait would be about an hour and a half.
About 30 minutes ago, it said an hour and 15 for an iteration of the recording.
Now it's back to an hour and a half. So I haven't moved anywhere in the projected wait time.  Arghhhh

ETA. It was answered right around 1.5 hours after I called even though the recording was still saying an hour and a half. And the agent was very thorough and quick in solving my problem. Nice job, Treasury Direct!

We feel your pain. This happened to us early on. Crap website. Crap support.

[dreaming]

Even though the form says not to, just get a notary stamp and include a letter saying you could not obtain the medallion, but you tried. They will accept it

I had mis-typed my bank account number when setting up my account, so I had to go through the medallion signature fiasco to get it changed.  That’s what I ended up doing as Wells Fargo does not do medallion anymore.  A banker talked with someone at TD the day prior and they told him that a notarized signature from someone at a financial institution was ok.  I just grabbed the card from the Wells Fargo employee who was the notary and sent it along with an explanation and my paperwork.  My bank account number was changed about a week later.