RESP: The Old Switcheroo

RESP fund withdrawal

After my tirade Money to Get Money one of the schools involved in my RESP escapades suddenly got very sensible, and I must somewhat retract some of my commentaries.

My middle daughter is going to Acadia University in Nova Scotia. She had not noticed anything on the website stating how to get a Letter of Enrollment or such, which might be needed for an RESP fund withdrawal, so she sent the Registrar for the school an e-mail asking what steps were required to be taken to get a letter like this and how long it might take.

This e-mail was sent on Sunday night, Monday morning, the school Registrar replied with an e-mail that included a scan of the official letter asking my daughter if this was sufficient. No money was spent, no forms filled out, no fuss, no muss, no worries, they just sent it. All I can think now is that in smaller Universities they have not taken the courses on how to get as much money as possible from your student population, or the large banks have not contacted the school yet about how their part in the Great RESP Sting is supposed to work.

I was flabbergasted to see this e-mail in my inbox, and now I can go off to my bank and see whether it is sufficient to start extricating funds from one of my daughters’ RESP. I am hopeful that this might do the trick, but if not, I am sure things can be put right quickly.

Interestingly, I have paid some of this daughter’s fees (a sizable deposit), but that was sufficient for the school to send me a letter of Full Enrollment, which was good of them. The other University I deal with took great pains to point out that they would not send out any letter of enrollment until fees were paid in full. Still, I have done that now, and I now await to find out how they deal with my request for a Letter of Enrollment (don’t worry, good reader, you will hear more about this as soon as it happens).

What to Write About Now

The only question is, what will I write about when my kids finally leave school? Don’t worry, good reader I have a large backlog of articles for your reading pleasure.