Account Garnishments - Detailed Workflow Guide

The following is a generic  guide of issues, tips, and common practices for a garnishment workflow in Safari.   

REMEMBER to check the Library in Safari for your company's specific version of this workflow guide or other policy instructions.  

TERMINOLOGY

"Account Garnishment" is a legal process by which a judgment creditor seeks to seize the assets of a judgment debtor held by a third party (called the garnishee).  There can be many names for this general process, including a garnishment, writ of attachment, execution, levy, seizure order, forfeiture, or other similar legal process or order.   For simplicity this help page refers to all of them as an account garnishment.

"Customer" is a generic reference to the debtor in a garnishment action.  For example, the customer/debtor could be a depositor of the FI or a vendor of a retailer that holds funds for the vendor.  Credit Unions typically refer to their depositors as “members,” but for simplicity this help page refers to all depositors as “customers.”

"FI"  means financial institution, which is also the garnishee.

"Garnishee" means the company that holds funds of the customer/debtor.  It is typically an FI or a retailer that holds funds of vendors.

"Issuing Authority" means the court, agency, or other authority that issues the legal order.  Often the Issuing Authority is different than the "Serving Party," although they can also be the same.  Safari allows you to track both the Issuing Authority and the Serving Party or indicate if they are the same.

THIS WORKFLOW GUIDE IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE

This Guide is not legal advice and should not be relied on to be legal advice.  Each company on Safari is solely responsible for determining the applicability and interpretation of cases, laws, statutes, and regulations as applied to its business and its use of Safari.  Safari is intended for use by customers with professional skill and knowledge of relevant legal requirements and each customer is solely responsible to obtain legal advice as necessary.

1.    Court order served on garnishee/FI

1.1  Inputting served documents into Safari.

If an automated download from your registered agent or an Intake Email does not automatically input the account garnishment in Safari, then you'll need to create a matter manually in Safari, and upload a file copy of the account garnishment into the Served folder.  To learn more about each of these options, see Add / Close Matters.

Issue:  The general rule is that an Issuing Authority won't have jurisdiction over an Entity that doesn't do business in the state of the Issuing Authority.  One exception is for federal agencies, and possibly state agencies in certain circumstances.         

Safari Configurable Warning:   You can configure Safari to provide a warning when this situation exists (but to be clear, Safari doesn't specify how to resolve this situation, which you must determine by your company's policy).  If a warning triggers, a Compliance section appears on the left side of the Matter.  To resolve the warning, enter an explanation in the resolution field.  See Workflow - Alerts and Warnings to learn more.

REMEMBER TO CHECK THE LIBRARY IN SAFARI for your company's specific policy for resolving this type of warning.

Issue:  The rules for exemptions, answer due dates, processing fee limitations, etc. vary depending on which state's laws apply.  Determining the applicate state law can be a complicated legal question that may depend on several factors, including the location of the Issuing Authority, the debtor/customer's residence, and/or the location of the account.  

The garnishee/FI processor determines this by accessing the core system records.  This is completed manually and cannot be automated in Safari.  If the debtor is not a customer or has no funds, after notifying the applicable parties, that matter should be closed with a status of "Closed No Account/Debtor" or "Closed No Funds."

Most garnishee/FIs save screenshots of the customer's account to show funds available at the time the order was received.  This gives your company liability protection if there was later a dispute about what funds existed at the time the garnishee received the legal order.

SAFARI TIP

Safari has built a special upload tool to help you upload one or more screenshots into Safari more quickly:

1. Click the +ACCOUNT button to create an account record, and enter the account number.  
2. Copy a screenshot of the customer's account to your clipboard.  
   
3. Click the paste image icon to the right of the Seized Funds field (see image below)
   
4. The image uploads as a file in the Financial folder, with the file name profiled with the account number.
   
5. Click  SAVE  to upload the file into Safari.  
   

REMEMBER TO CHECK THE LIBRARY IN SAFARI for your company's specific policy for resolving this type of warning.

Whatever your company's method of seizing funds, you should record the amount in the Seized Funds field associated with the account.  If any funds are not seized because of federal or state exemptions, document that in the Account Notes field.

Sometimes it's easiest to fill out the forms by hand, mail them, and upload a copy in the Answer folder.  If the form is set by statute and has some flexibility in format, consider creating a template to automate the generation of an answer.

Laws or regulations may require a notice be sent to the customer/debtor.  Typically those are physically mailed.  Consider creating a template to automate the generation of these notices.  

When you receive a full or partial release from the garnishor, do the following:

1. Click the RELEASE TO DEBTOR button to the right of the Judgment / Lien Amount field.
   
2. Enter the Release Amount, the Release Date, and any Release Notes.
   
3. Upload a copy of the Release in the Served folder.
   
4. Update the seized funds amounts in the accounts section reflecting how much is currently frozen (the update reflects that the released funds have been unfrozen for the customer).
   
5. Click  SAVE .
   
6. Once you click SAVE, Safari will dynamically update the Pending Amount field (see Acct.Gar.-Financial-Related Data).

Some states specify a fixed number of days for payment.  You should enter the date for this payment in the Date Due (Payment) field when you create the Matter.  When you change the status for the Matter to be To Do Payment, then this date appears in the header for the Matter and on the Matter Listing page.  

Some states don't specify a fixed number of days for the payment, and instead require the garnishee/FI to wait until it receives a court order.  In this situation, do not enter a date in the Date Due (Payment) field, and instead change the status of the Matter to On Hold Court Action.

You can store the Payee information in the Creditor / Payee section on the left side of the Matter.  To record a payment, do the following:

1. If you are paying funds from the actual customer account, click the payment icon to the right of the Seized Funds field.  (See image below; note that you won't see this icon if your company has set up a default account in the company and Entity setup pages.)  This automatically creates a payment entry recording the customer account and amount.  
   
   
2. Otherwise, click the +PAYMENT button in the Payments section on the left side.  If you are paying from a GL Account, then your system Admin can create a default value for the account number that will prefill (see Setup - Companies, Entities, and Offices). 

NOTE ABOUT DATA VALIDATION.  When you create a payment record, Safari prefills the amount with the lesser of the Pending Amount or the Total Amount Seized.  Safari won't allow you to make a payment entry that is greater than either of those values.

1.  Record the garnishor fees you've received in the Garnishor Fees field.

2.  Record any processing fee you charge your customer in the Processing Fee field.  State law may limit that amount, and/or specify whether it can be charged first or after the payment to the garnishor.   Consult your company's policies to determine what amount you can collect.

Note that Safari does not calculate these amounts and end users must determine and enter them.