RESP: and More Trees Died

For those of you who have not read about my yearly pilgrimage to the Bank to withdraw money from my children’s RESP account, I strongly suggest you check out my list of articles at the end of this post, but yes, I again return to TD Canada Trust to extract money, and again it was an interesting process.

Luckily, I learned last year, so I already had my Proof of Enrollment letters from each University for each of my daughters (you must have this or no money for you (at least no CESG or growth at least)). These letters can either be a simple download (from Acadia U), or a request for the letter with a fee (like I had to for Wilfrid Laurier). Step one complete, I knew I was going to at least end up with money at the end of my appointment.

Appointment you say? Yes, at TD, because I had a TD Mutual Funds RESP account, I could not do this transaction with a teller, I had to make an appointment with a Mutual Fund Specialist (I kid you not that is the title). I made the appointment on Saturday and on Tuesday went and talked to the same woman I normally deal with at the Bank. I am not sure if this particular (very patient) young lady really enjoys my visits (since I typically show up with a shopping list of things to do), but that is a side note.

The tasks we ended up finally achieving (after over 60 minutes of elapsed time):

• Withdrew money from two different mutual funds in 1 daughter’s account
• Withdrew money from two other mutual funds from another daughter’s account
• Set up a Learning Bond account for my son (which is only offered in a GIC account from TD), I will discuss this one in a later post.
• Fixed an issue where an RRSP account was not viewable on-line
• Discuss the rate of interest I am paying on my Mortgage (hopefully I get a lower rate, never hurts to ask)

I hear you saying, but BCM, why did the Trees die? Well at the end of all these transactions, I had seen printed over 200 pages of paper for various reasons, and I actually came home with a stack of paper over an inch in height of documents that my wife had to sign (she only had to sign her name about 30 times).

Why print so much stuff? Auditors, Lawyers and Covering Asses (oh my), no word of a lie! Most of the documents were from the TD Mutual Funds side of things, pointing out that I need to revisit my savings patterns, and then signing over and over (and initialing) saying that I know this is the case. Then there were the “you know you are taking money out of a mutual fund don’t you” forms, and a bunch of others, where I am afraid I may have actually given up rights to my left kidney (I hope not, but it was a blinding river of paper).

The actual RESP transactions were done on 4 pieces of paper, most of the rest of the paper were supporting documents?!? Holy crap that was a lot of paper. What ever happened to the paperless society?

The final score was, money from RESP extracted, Learning Bond set up, and RRSP account issue cleared up (eventually) too, and it only took over 60 minutes and 200 pieces of paper (and about 60 signatures). Why you may ask? I have no idea why, and I would love to hear from anyone who might have a guess as to why that amount of paper must be produced to verify and do the transactions I just did.

The RESP Chronicles

Remember last year’s rants about RESPs? You don’t? Well here they are:

• RESP Wrinkles where I first learned taking out money from an RESP wasn’t going to be as easy as the previous year.
• RESP Money to get Money where I found out how much it cost to prove I just spent $2500
• RESP: The Old Switcheroo where I rant about one Universities trick for getting more money out of me
• RESPs and Rules taking your own money out shouldn’t be this hard, should it?
• RESP: Withdrawals Redux then I learned that call centers and local branches do not talk nor really acknowledge each other’s existance
• RESP: This Round Finally Ends (Prologue) I actually try to start taking money out of the RESP
• RESP: Lessons Learned it’s important to write down what you have learned so you remember it for the next time.