Identification of Signatures A signature is the name of a person written, stamped, or in scribed by himself. In law and business, signatures have come to play a most important role as a means of proof, identification, and intention, in commercial instruments and legal documents. The identification of signatures is a specialty and comes through constantly familiarizing oneself with them. Over a period of years a person changes his signature considerably. It is, there fore, necessary to renew signature files from time to time to keep them up to date.
The department keeps an up-to-date card file containing the names of every account on the bank's books, arranged alphabeti cally, and giving the date of opening and the address of the cus tomer. It also keeps another card file containing the name of every person whose signature is on file, together with his title and the institution with which he is identified. These files have cross-references whereby at a glance may be seen the various concerns with which a certain person is connected, his office in each, and the date when his authority to sign was received. The by-laws, resolutions of boards of directors, powers of attorney, surrogates' certificates, wills, and joint-account letters, which have been received in the process of assembling signatures, may also be filed in this department or with the general bookkeepers.
The signature department is an offspring of the paying teller's department. Its greatest intimacy is with that department and the check desk, as it receives most items from these. Items come, however, from practically every department of the bank. Sig natures of foreigners are best handled by a specialized subdivision of the foreign division, for the law and custom of foreign coun tries differ widely from domestic law and custom and are better known to the foreign division.
Routine of Work The general routine of the signature department practically starts with the incoming exchanges from the clearing house. After these checks have been sorted they are submitted to the signature department for careful scrutiny as to the comparison of the body and figures and as to the signatures. Items found regular are returned to the department submitting them. Ir regularities found in either or amounts are immediately communicated to the maker by telephone or telegraph; but before advising the maker the department should inquire whether the account has a sufficient balance to meet the check, whether payment has been stopped on it, and whether the customer has given any instructions as to irregular checks. The amount of the
check and the character of the payee have much to do with the manner in which the department handles irregular checks. If the amount is comparatively small and the check is in favor of a bank or other creditable concern, it is often paid to avoid possible inconvenience to the bank's customers or to their business rela tions, and the drawer is then advised of the bank's action. A check that necessitates wiring is returned to the presenting bank, with a notation of the action taken and a request that it be held until the drawer sends instructions; upon receipt of instructions the department immediately communicates with the bank hold ing the check, which thereupon either presents it for certification or puts it through the clearing house the following morning.
Procurement of Signatory Authority The value of a signature depends upon its authority, and it is expedient that the department take great care to have only properly authorized signatures. Authority is vested differently for each kind of account.
Unless otherwise advised, the department assumes that the president, vice-president, and cashier of a national bank have unrestricted authority to transact the ordinary business of the bank. It therefore gets the signatures of these officers and has them acknowledged by the cashier. In some banks the signatory authority is delegated to certain tellers, the auditor, or book keeper; in such cases the department has a form of resolution which it asks the board of directors of the bank to pass and return duly certified by its secretary over the corporate seal. Such a resolution must state that such and such parties are authorized to sign certain instruments for a specified time, and that such instruments so signed are a correct and lawful charge against the account of the bank. Sometimes a drawee out-of-town bank asks its metropolitan correspondent to honor at par checks drawn by certain of its customers; this enables a bank's customer to have reserve city funds without opening an account in the metropolitan institution. In such cases the signature department of the reserve city bank asks for a resolution of the board of directors of the out of-town bank authorizing the former to pay and charge to the latter's account checks of the customer in question and stating the maximum amount to which such checks may be honored in any one day.