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Email this11:59 am
May 3, 2013
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If my deposit with PC Financial has more than $100,000, CDIC stated that the excess is not insured since the insurance covers only up to $100,000. Would CIBC step in, if PC Financial goes under, and
takes over the uninsured amount as not having been a lost on my part. Please reply ASAP. I'm only a lurker who happened to stumble on your website hoping I'll get an answer from you guys. I've inquired from CIBC ombudsman, PC Financial customer care, PC financial people at Loblaws pavilion, etc. but none can give me an answer. Turning to you for an answer is my last resort for now.
1:00 pm
February 22, 2013
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Short answer: NO.
CDIC covers bank accounts in Canada. Each account is covered up to $100,000.00. That's it! If PC Financial went under CDIC would be the entity covering your PC Financial deposit, up to $100,000.00. For that matter, if CIBC went under CDIC would be the entity covering any CIBC deposit account , again up to $100,000.00.
There are ways round this -- accounts held individually are separate from accounts held jointly. For more detailed info see this link to CIDC's website..
And from the latest (January 2013) privacy policy: ".... to your PC Financial personal banking products. which are provided by the direct banking division of CIBC ....".
6:31 pm
December 23, 2011
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piotrus said
If my deposit with PC Financial has more than $100,000, CDIC stated that the excess is not insured since the insurance covers only up to $100,000. Would CIBC step in, if PC Financial goes under, and
takes over the uninsured amount as not having been a lost on my part. Please reply ASAP. I'm only a lurker who happened to stumble on your website hoping I'll get an answer from you guys. I've inquired from CIBC ombudsman, PC Financial customer care, PC financial people at Loblaws pavilion, etc. but none can give me an answer. Turning to you for an answer is my last resort for now.
Check here. http://www.cdic.ca/WhereInsure.....fault.aspx
One would assume if PC Financial was in trouble and CIBC would take over .... but another institution could also take over .... and keep in mind what assume means ... lol.
Being proactive, I would consider not going over 90,000 in any CDIC institution and find other CDIC high interest institutions (only if you are comfortable with them) to deal with as well or a Credit Union as they are usually unlimited. Take a look at what your province CU's have to offer, Winnipeg CU's as well.
Also keep in mind that some CU's (BC for sure) offer insurance on US dollar accounts while CDIC does NOT.
Depending on how many accounts you have at PC like savings, chequing, TFSA, RRSP etc. Sometimes they say that a joint account may be covered for 100000 and a TFSA for another 100000 etc. ... something you need to verify on the CDIC site.
11:17 am
December 12, 2009
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Umm, if you're suggesting deposit insurance for PC Financial and CIBC is insured separately, you are wholly incorrect. (Edit: In short, Greg's answer is mostly correct but I seek to add some additional clarity with this response. kanaka's response is the incorrect one to which I was referring.)
PC Financial operates simply as a "branch transit" of CIBC. If you have accounts in the same ownership (i.e., sole with same Social Insurance Number - not joint with one and sole with another) with both companies, the CDIC deposit limits would be the same and I believe CIBC's and PCF's deposit insurance disclosure pages on their websites reflect this.
I just wanted to clarify this as this is an important distinction that must be spread incorrectly.
That said, deposits with a "Big 5" bank like CIBC really don't need deposit insurance. The whole deposit insurance scheme is reassurance we don't really need and meant for the smaller institutions. If CIBC had failed completely, the world and Canada would be in a very sorry state, everyone would've already rushed to traditional safe havens like gold and mattresses and we'd all be building underground bunkers and protecting our personal property with various traditional means, if you know what I mean. In short, it'd be a situation I'd not want to be in. 
Cheers,
Doug
12:52 pm
December 23, 2011
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Doug said
Umm, if you're suggesting deposit insurance for PC Financial and CIBC is insured separately, you are wholly incorrect. (Edit: In short, Greg's answer is mostly correct but I seek to add some additional clarity with this response. kanaka's response is the incorrect one to which I was referring.)
PC Financial operates simply as a "branch transit" of CIBC. If you have accounts in the same ownership (i.e., sole with same Social Insurance Number - not joint with one and sole with another) with both companies, the CDIC deposit limits would be the same and I believe CIBC's and PCF's deposit insurance disclosure pages on their websites reflect this.
I just wanted to clarify this as this is an important distinction that must be spread incorrectly.
That said, deposits with a "Big 5" bank like CIBC really don't need deposit insurance. The whole deposit insurance scheme is reassurance we don't really need and meant for the smaller institutions. If CIBC had failed completely, the world and Canada would be in a very sorry state, everyone would've already rushed to traditional safe havens like gold and mattresses and we'd all be building underground bunkers and protecting our personal property with various traditional means, if you know what I mean. In short, it'd be a situation I'd not want to be in.
Cheers,
Doug
Thanks. I only put this in because I recalled looking at CDIC in regards to mergers. I dont use PC. I did not realize there was a disclaimer. I stand corrected.
My point remains:
Being proactive, I would consider not going over 90,000 in any CDIC institution and find other CDIC high interest institutions (only if you are comfortable with them) to deal with as well or a Credit Union as they are usually unlimited.
10:08 am
May 3, 2013
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After my last post, I farther inquire by phone from a few PC Financial Services personnel and got an answer which made more sense tho' I'm not 100% satisfied. I was told that since PC Financial operates as a 'direct banking division of CIBC' to provide personal banking services to customer of Loblaws, they are really one bank but operates independently from each other and that the only service common to both are the CIBC ATM/ABM which PC Financial clients are allowed to use in addition to PC Financial's own ATM/ABM located at many Loblaws grocery sites. They attempted to answer the one question I seek the answer for after which they arrived at the conclusion that no one can really give the correct answer because it has not happened yet i.e. PC Financial Services has never gone under before. The one thing that triggered my first post as to whether the two are actually one bank was when I was told at the loblaws pavilion that PC Financial personnel are being paid their salaries by CIBC and that funds we deposit to our accounts at PC Financial go to CIBC. In addition, I asked where I can have a look at PC Financial's Income Statement & Balance Sheet inorder for me to have an opinion about PC Financial's profitability and their assets. Again I was told that no such statements are prepared for PC Financial but are found on CIBC's Financial Statements not as a separate PC Financial statement but combined with CIBC's. I was even told at the pavilion to go ahead and deposit more than $100,000 because PC Financial cannot go under without CIBC getting bankrupt. It's even more confusing for me now what to believe after reading many of the posting in reply to my first post. CDIC said that if $60,000 was deposited to PC Financial and another $60,000 was deposited to CIBC, they cover only $100.000 of the combined amount of $120,000 i.e the $20,000 in excess is not insured because the insurance premium is paid only by CIBC and none is paid by PC Financial. I raised the question of Bank of Nova Scotia and Ing Direct and I was told that Scotiabank paid their own premium and Ing Direct their own which is why deposit to Scotiabank is insured up to $100,000 and deposit to Ing Direct is insured up to $100,000 i. e they are separate insured. I'm sorry for this long post. I only want to share with you the result of my inquiries since the money involved in excess of the insurable amount is very large and that I don't think I'll be posting often in this forum. Thank you all for your replies to enlighten me.
1:47 pm
December 12, 2009
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It may be one long paragraph, piotrus, but well said. You said it very succinctly in terms of CDIC coverage. Because Loblaw has contracted its day-to-day banking, mortgages/non-real estate secured lending and investment services businesses to CIBC, essentially giving them the exclusive right to the PC Financial banner for those types of products (i.e., excluding insurance services and MasterCard, which are operated separately from CIBC), all of the deposits and credit facilities of PC Financial are reported on CIBC's balance sheet. As such, essentially, PC Financial's banking and investment services operate as a "branch" (a "transit") of CIBC and, for the purposes of CDIC, $100,000 with PC Financial and $100,000 with CIBC in the same ownership (i.e., single person's name or same two persons' names) are calculated together and would result in $100,000 being not insured.
ING Direct Canada, soon to be renamed and likely by the end of 2013, continues to operate as a separate wholly-owned subsidiary of The Bank of Nova Scotia, in much the same way TD Bank Group operates First Nations Bank of Canada or many banks operate trust and loan/mortgage company subsidiaries that pay separate CDIC insurance premiums. So yes, your ING Direct deposits would be insured separately (just like any deposits with Scotia Trust or CIBC Mortgage Corp. are insured separately from The Bank of Nova Scotia and CIBC, for example). Down the road, though, potentially as an efficiency/cost savings exercise, I could see ING Direct folded into The Bank of Nova Scotia and operate as a separate "branch" of Scotiabank but within the same CDIC deposit limits. If that were to happen, I believe in the case of CDIC member institution mergers, the two deposit limits continue to be insured together, even if it exceeds $100,000 combined, but that any new deposits would be uninsured (i.e., $60,000 with BNS and $50,000 with ING, resulting $110,000 insured but any new deposits would be uninsured). Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Cheers,
Doug
11:10 am
May 3, 2013
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Doug
Bank of Nova Scotia Ombudsman stated that their relationship with Ingdirect might go in the same direction as CIBC & President's Choice Financial. It is too early to say now when & how it would happen because IngDirect was only acquired by ScotiaBank in August 2012 and therefore still in transition period.
One of the things I forgot to mention in my previous posting was President's Choice claim that it is not
operating as a 'branch' of CIBC but CIBC is under licence to use President's Choice Financial name (a registered trademark of Loblaws) to provide direct banking services to loblaws customers. That is the main reason they're saying the two are actually one bank. PC, President's Choice, President's Choice Financial Services are registered trademark of Loblaw's and CIBC is a licencee of these registered trademarks. CIBC is not licensed to use President's Choice Bank and this bank used to provide only Mastercard services and was not even listed as having insurance with CDIC who claim that President's Choice Bank has just recently been added in their list of CDIC member. President's Choice Bank is now, just recently, offering mortgage services when they did not before.
10:45 am
December 12, 2009
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I don't know to what you're referring to about the Scotiabank Group's Ombudsman. Unless you have a specific e-mail message or documentation to cite, it remains hearsay.
In terms of CIBC and PC Financial, the trademark issue is a valid concern. It essentially means that CIBC is only used to use the PC Financial brand. That said, if Loblaw decides to attempt to uproot its customers to another provider, it can do so and CIBC would be without that brand name. That said, it would be very difficult and expensive for Loblaw to do. Doing so would require it to contact what are essentially CIBC customers under the PC Financial banner (presumably they have access to this information through data sharing provisions of the agreement) and offer them new banking services under a different institution and transit/branch number, requiring all new chequebooks and to go through the Davis+Henderson eSwitch process (essentially, the same as switching banks).
President's Choice Bank may be a CDIC member but that doesn't mean the deposits are insured separately since, as far as I'm aware, the deposits are held through a CIBC branch transit ("30800"). Like I said above, they could, in theory, begin offering banking/deposit services but would be a hugely expensive transition. In short, CIBC is sitting pretty in this regard.
That said, PC Financial's banking services are provided by CIBC and technically operate as a branch transit of CIBC (look at the bottom of your chequebooks; it likely says "30800-010," indicating "30800" is your branch of institution number "010" which is CIBC).
Hope that helps,
Doug
7:58 pm
September 4, 2013
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I called CDIC directly and asked them this: "If I have $100K in a PC Financial account and another $100K in CIBC account (all under my name), how much am I covered by CDIC if either one or both institutions fail?". There answer is: "PC Financial and CIBC are listed separately under CDIC so they are treated as separate entity; your $100K in each PC Financial AND $100K in CIBC are both covered. So the answer is $200K coverage."
8:39 pm
August 4, 2010
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@GICLover: I don't think your information is correct. "PC Financial" is NOT listed as a CDIC member. What is listed is "President's Choice Bank". However, "President's Choice Bank" doesn't (AFAIK) have anything to do with PC Financial savings and chequing products. These are PCF-branded offerings of CIBC, and almost certainly count under the CIBC limits for CDIC purposes. If you look at the PCF site, they themselves send you to a CIBC deposit insurance page for more info. For PCF savings/chequing, you aren't dealing with President's Choice Bank.
President's Choice Bank presumably acts in their credit card and mortgage business for now. If you look at the OSFI data, PC Bank has absolutely ZERO demand deposits (savings and chequing). What they do have is around $275 million in fixed term deposits. This could include GICs that they are offering somewhere (perhaps with deposit brokers) under PC Bank, although I believe the GICs on the PC Financial site are CIBC products. See this thread for some confusion on this.
In any case, if you have both CIBC and PC Financial products with combined amounts approaching CDIC limits, make sure you check this out more specifically. CDIC is perfectly correct in saying that eligible PC Bank products are separately insured, but what most people think of as "President's Choice" deposits don't come from PC Bank!
9:03 pm
August 1, 2013
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GICLover, you are correct. CIBC and PC Financial are separate financial institutions. In this case they are banks covered under the CDIC $100,000 maximum deposit limit. There is another interesting fact that I mentioned about 10 days ago, August-22-2013 in my prior post about PC Financial.
PC financial pays 2.25% for a 5 year GIC but Presidents Choice bank is the same as PC Financial and is available only through a GIC broker, agent, financial adviser or investment agent and pays 2.81% for a 5 year GIC. PC Financial is paying their direct clients less than through a GIC broker, agent, investment adviser, financial adviser.
This is a big difference of 56 basis points per year or a total of 280 basis points over 5 years. This is simple interest. If you have a compound 5 year GIC, it is a total of 309.43 basis points. This is total of $309.43 less interest per $10,000 5 year GIC. President's Choice Bank pays a 4 year GIC rate at 2.56% versus PC Financial's 4 year GIC rate at 2.00%.
Under the list of CDIC members, President's Choice Bank is listed not PC Financial. PC Financial is owned by President's Choice Bank. Please, anyone do not think that having money with PC Financial and President's Choice Bank are covered separately. PC Financial and President's Choice Bank is combined insured, protected, guaranteed by CDIC by $100,000 not $200,000 together.
Remember, CDIC insures, protects, guarantees, principal and interest up to maximum $100,000. This means if you have a 5 year compound GIC with Home Trust at 3.00%, do not have more than $86,260 principal invested. This would add up to $99,998.98.
If you are investing in a 5 year GIC that pays annual interest of 3.00% then you should not have more than $97,087 principal invested. This would add up to under $100,000 in a year. It is exactly, $99,996.61 after 1 year principal and interest.
Make sure you remember to withdrawal the interest of $2,921.61 every year and deposit it in another CDIC member financial institution or any other government backed, sponsored entity or crown corporation like DICO. Make sure at the other financial institution, you don't pass the deposit limit of $100,000 by CDIC or any other deposit lmit.
For more information go to http://www.cdic.ca and http://www.dico.com. You can refer to my other past posts for ther website addresses on government backed deposit limit insurance, protection and guarantee.
10:40 pm
August 4, 2010
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SD2013 said
CIBC and PC Financial are separate financial institutions. In this case they are banks covered under the CDIC $100,000 maximum deposit limit...Presidents Choice bank is the same as PC Financial...PC Financial is owned by President's Choice Bank. Please, anyone do not think that having money with PC Financial and President's Choice Bank are covered separately. PC Financial and President's Choice Bank is combined insured, protected, guaranteed by CDIC by $100,000 not $200,000 together.
Your error is in part caused by your sloppy use of the various names involved. "PC Financial" is a brand of Loblaws, used for savings/chequing, mortgages, credit cards and more. Some of these products, like the bank accounts, are offered by CIBC, which licenses the PC Financial brand name from Loblaws. Other products are offered through PC Bank, which is a direct subsidiary of Loblaws. These include the credit cards and mortgages. For GICs, the ones on the PC Financial website are offered through CIBC, while PC Bank offers (different) GICs through separate brokerage channels.
If you buy a GIC from the website, it is a CIBC product, on CIBC's balance sheet, and almost certainly is part of your CIBC limits for CDIC insurance purposes - those GICs have no relationship to PC Bank. If you aren't clear about these differences you will continue to make mistakes in this area.
12:35 am
August 1, 2013
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So is it correct to say that a depositor at PC Bank has $100,000 CDIC coverage and a depositor at CIBC has $100,000 CDIC coverage but P.C. Financial does not have separate coverage from CIBC. I went to P.C. financial's website and clicked on CDIC Deposit Insurance Information and CIBC comes up but nothing about PC Financial.
So if this is correct, people make sure that you don't think that you have $100,000 CDIC coverage for each P.C. Financial, PC bank, CIBC for a $300,000 total CDIC coverage. You have $100,000 CDIC coverage for PC Bank and $100,000 CDIC combined coverage for PC Financial and CIBC as PC Financial 's personal banking services is a direct division of CIBC.
You only have maximum combined $200,000 CDIC coverage if you have deposited money in all these 3 places. This means make sure you don't have more than $100,000 combined deposited in CIBC and PC Financial as they are the same with a different name. There is no CDIC coverage separately for PC Financial. This is why CDIC has no PC Financial listed as a member institution on their website.
12:16 am
December 12, 2009
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Thanks NorthernRaven for correcting the legal entities involved in CDIC coverage as it does add to confusion. Thanks SD2013 for your commentary on this as you have still provided relevant discussion.
However, to simplify, deposits with "PC Financial" (the brand name used under a long-term license agreement from Loblaw Companies Ltd. by CIBC and run by CIBC's direct banking division) are insured with CDIC as part of CIBC's deposit coverage. So, in essence, if I have $50,000 in non-registered high-interest savings accounts in my own name with CIBC and $55,000 with "PC Financial" in the same, $100,000 of my $105,000 combined deposits are CDIC insured.
If you hold deposits with President's Choice Bank (owned by Loblaw Companies Ltd.) via a deposit broker/financial intermediary such as an asset manager of some sort, those deposits would be insured separately.
So, in short, if we could refer to "PC Financial" as CIBC deposits/mortgages/mutual funds and "President's Choice Bank" as the Loblaw entity that sells bank deposits only through the deposit broker channel (not directly or via pavilions, as per their licensing agreement with CIBC) as well as insurance products through its sister company, PC Insurance Agency Inc., that would be awesome.
Cheers,
Doug
6:48 am
February 22, 2013
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Doug said
[snip]
So, in short, if we could refer to "PC Financial" as CIBC deposits/mortgages/mutual funds and "President's Choice Bank" as the Loblaw entity that sells bank deposits only through the deposit broker channel (not directly or via pavilions, as per their licensing agreement with CIBC) as well as insurance products through its sister company, PC Insurance Agency Inc., that would be awesome.
[snip]
Or we could just agree to keep no more than $100k in anything that looks or sounds like it might be associated with Loblaws and/or CIBC. That works for me! 
Greg
PS - my summer is over and Implicity is still working towards live links on the Internet. Typical IT project. 
8:48 am
December 12, 2009
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hey Greg,
For simplicity sake, yes that would work too. 
I was just wanting to clarify the different "corporate machinations" of PC Financial as I wasn't aware Loblaw Companies, through President's Choice Bank, was effectively selling its own GICs through the deposit broker channel, in competition with "CIBC doing business as PC Financial" through the retail, branch-based and online channel. So, it is still possible to have separately insured deposits with "PC Financial" (one with CIBC dba PC Financial; the other with Loblaw subsidiary President's Choice Bank through one's deposit broker).
Cheers,
Doug
P.S. Yes, the Implicity delay in adding "me 2 me transfers" is starting to irritate me now. That said, it'll be worth the wait as MemberDirect is a far superior platform compared to Hubert Financial's hobbled together online banking system and their e-Statements are gorgeous!
5:53 am
February 22, 2013
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Doug:
As you may remember I stuck $1000 in Implicity just after you opened your account. Since then I have just "ignored" it as I "can't easily get at it".
I'm traveling till the end of the year and so am not near an ATM to get the money out and sure don't want to add any by mail. I just count on PC Fin or ING having yet another sale and me being intuitive enough to have the account empty when the sale is announced so I can take advantage of it. My cash is with PC Fin today and I am just realizing I am likely too llate to get it out by Oct 15th.
I just now decided I am going to pull it over to RBC for a few days and hope I make any cutoff they may have.
Greg
10:07 am
December 12, 2009
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hey Greg,
If you already have a grandfathered HSBC Advance Savings Account, I'd recommend them as a "hub" bank for bank-to-bank transfers as, although they use a paper-based account linking/bank-to-bank transfer application process/form, they are very liberal on what forms they will accept to verify the bank account (i.e., it doesn't have to be a VOID cheque like ING Direct Canada, which is one of ING Direct Canada's only real major downsides) and they allow an unlimited number of accounts to be linked whereas both ING Direct Canada has a limit of 3 (very low, in my opinion) and Hubert Financial does have a technical limit of 100. How many does PC Financial allow to be linked? If more than three, it might be worth me opening an account there. Do they offer a paperless, electronic external account verification process?
If you don't have an HSBC Advance Savings Account, please disregard most of the above paragraph because, as of Oct. 1st, it is a "grandfathered" account and no future accounts can be opened by any client segment (i.e., retail, Advance or Premier). It's also possible that, in the future, existing accounts could be converted to a High Rate Savings Account, which is subject to fees.
In terms of a "savings sale", as I said this summer, don't count on it. ING's fall "sale" is its TFSA Kickstart Account, followed by their winter "sale" to attract TFSA and RRSP deposits. I wouldn't expect a "sale" for non-registered deposits for either PC Financial or ING Direct Canada (to be renamed, likely in December of this year, based on Scotiabank Group Head of Canadian Banking Anatol van Hohn's comments on the Q3 analyst conference call in August, and won't come soon enough in my opinion - Scotiabank needs to ditch the foreign bank branding and 'orange' colour scheme and should've done so sooner in my opinion as I've grown extremely tired of the name 'ING') prior to March/April 2014. You would be reasonably safe putting the funds in, let's say, a Canadian Direct Financial or Hubert Financial HISA to maximize your interest earnings.
Cheers,
Doug
2:04 pm
February 22, 2013
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Doug:
I don't have an HSBC account. Not sure how I missed that as I seem to have everything else.
If PC Fin don't announce anything in the next week or so I will move the money back til Oct 31 and will then move it to Canadian Tire and grit my teeth while I get 1.5%. I continue to count on Implicity's IT contractor getting their act together. It can't be that hard!! (I've worked too many IT projects to say that with a straight face. Whatever can go wrong usually does, in spades.)
I'm busy swimming and getting a sun burn so cannot devote as much time as I would normally to HISA manipulations.
Greg
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