Farmers' Bank & Trust Co. v. Newland

31 S.W. 38, 97 Ky. 464, 1895 Ky. LEXIS 213
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedMay 11, 1895
StatusPublished
Cited by21 cases

This text of 31 S.W. 38 (Farmers' Bank & Trust Co. v. Newland) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Farmers' Bank & Trust Co. v. Newland, 31 S.W. 38, 97 Ky. 464, 1895 Ky. LEXIS 213 (Ky. Ct. App. 1895).

Opinion

.JUDGE PAYNTER

demvered the opinion oe the court.

By this action appellee sought to recover of appellant bank, damages for its alleged failure to collect a certain certificate of deposit wbicb had been issued to him by the Pineville Banking Co. for the sum of five hundred dollars, and which he had delivered to the appellant bank for collection before the maturity of the certificate, which certificate matured on the 18th day of July, .1893. It is alleged in.the petition that the appellant did not present the certificate of deposit until July 24th, 1893, “and that defendant on said day surrendered said certificate to the payor thereof, the said Pineville Banking Company, and negligently failed then and since to collect from said company the amount as aforesaid, of the certificate or any part thereof, and thereby plaintiff says he was damaged in the amount of five hundred dollars.”

There is no allegation that the bank could have collected [468]*468the amount of the certificate at any time after it received it for collection, or that the surrender of the certificate prevented such collection, or that the Pineville Banking Co. thereafter refused to surrender the certificate, nor are there any facts alleged which show the alleged negligence has caused him to lose his debt against the Pineville Banking Company.

For these reasons the petition was defective. However, as the judgment must be reversed, we will briefly consider other questions raised by the answer, to which a demurrer was sustained.

It is alleged in the answer that the certificate of deposit was given to it for collection in its usual course of business as a banker; that the certificate was received July 22, 1893, and that on the day it was received it was enclosed in a letter addressed to J. M. Pursifull, cashier of the Pineville Banking Company, which was duly stamped and mailed to him at Pineville, Ky., and in which he was requested to collect and remit x>roceeds to it; that the letter was received by him on the 23d of July, 1893, after banking hours, and on the next business day he presented the certificate at ihe office of the Pineville Banking Company for payment, when he received therefor the check of the Pineville Banking Company on the Louisville Banking Company, payable to the order of the appellant, for the amount of the certificate of deposit, and on receipt of which he surrendered the certificate of deposit to the Pineville Banking Company.

On the 28th of July, 1893, Pursifull enclosed the bank’s check to the appellant, and it, in due course of mail, sent the check to appellant’s correspondent at Louisville, Ky., for presentment and payment, which was accordingly done without delay, and the payment refused because the Pine-ville Banking Company had made an assignment for the [469]*469benefit of its creditors, this assignment being made between the time the check was sent to appellant and the time when it was presented for payment.

It is alleged that the Pineville Banking Company had much more money to its credit in the Louisville Banking Company, subject' to check, than the amount called for by the check, and that the Louisville Banking Company is solvent.

It is further alleged that for many years it had been the general custom of banks in Kentucky that when a bank received from a customer for collection, a check or other claim on a bank in good standing, in a distant part of the State, and which was the correspondent of the transmitting bank, to send such check or claim directly to that bank, either with request for payment and credit of proceeds to the transmitting bank, or with request to remit proceeds, and if the requestwas to remit proceeds the correspondent bankwould remit by its check on some bank in Louisville, or other commercial center, with which it had sufficient funds on deposit to pay the check; that the Pineville Banking Company was at the time the certificate of deposit was sent to its cashier and has always been in good financial repute; that the Pine-ville Banking Company was its correspondent at Pineville. It is contended by appellant that having received the certificate for collection it had the right to follow the custom of banks in making such collections, and send it directly to its correspondent with request that proceeds be remitted, notwithstanding the correspondent was the payor of the certificate, and further, that it had the right to receive in payment of the certificate, the check on the Louisville Banking Company.

In this country there is a great conflict in the opinions of the courts of several States on the question of the extent of [470]*470the duty and responsibility of banks wlio receive a collection on a place distant from its place of business, and as to bow far it is liable for tbe acts of its correspondents or sub-agents in tbe performance of tbeir duties.

Some courts bold tbe transmitting bank is liable for any negligence or default of tbe agent or correspondent which it selects to make the collection. Other courts hold that the bank receiving a claim for collection in a place distant from the place where the bank is engaged in business can only be required to exercise due care and diligence in selecting a competent and trustworthy agent or correspondent, and if it exercises such care and diligence in making such selection, the bank is exonerated from all liability. We do not deem it necessary to analyze and discuss the various and conflicting decisions upon this question.

When a customer deposits with a bank a note, bill of exchange, certificate of deposit, check, etc., for collection at a point distant from the location of the bank, he must know the bank can not send one of its officers or agents to such, point to make the collection. He is presumed to know the method employed by banks in making such collections. He knows that the bank must select some other bank or agency to aid in accomplishing the undertaking imposed on it. He has made the bank his agent for that purpose. He has'employed the bank to do, through its methods of making-collection, that which would cost him much time and money to do himself.' When he so engages the bank and makes-it his agent to make the collection, he does so with the implied understanding that the bank will follow the customary method in making such collections, which necessitates the' selection of agents or correspondents at other points to carry out the undertaking, and the bank can only be held respon[471]*471sible for the exercise of due care and diligence in making such selection.

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31 S.W. 38, 97 Ky. 464, 1895 Ky. LEXIS 213, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/farmers-bank-trust-co-v-newland-kyctapp-1895.