Mixed signals from banks, for US citizens in Switzerland
Updated 01:00 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Swiss banks have become more cautious in their relations with US citizens in the wake of problems the country’s largest bank, UBS, ran into in 2008 with the IRS over unreported income on the part of some of its clients. GenevaLunch, in a survey of several Lake Geneva area banks, found that without exception the banks say they do not discriminate against US citizens, and they continue to welcome new accounts. Stories nevertheless abound in Switzerland of US citizens who received letters in early 2009 from their banks saying their accounts were being closed – but few of of these people will speak openly about such letters, in part because the IRS tax authority encourages citizens to report on others who are not “compliant” in filing taxes as well as listing all worldwide assets.
US Ambassador Beyer suggests UBS could turn over fewer names
A GenevaLunch reporting team this week spoke with several people to determine the extent to which the personal banking problem is real or a recent urban myth. The team talked to seven of the eight banks which returned its calls and to a number of US citizens resident in Switzerland, as well as with members of American Citizens Abroad (ACA). Some of those interviewed participated in an informal meeting in Geneva 12 November with the new US ambassador to Switzerland, Donald Beyer, where the banking problem was raised.
Beyer later in the day told WRS public radio in Geneva that some 9,000 Americans took advantage of an IRS amnesty for citizens overseas that ended 15 October. He suggested in the radio interview that the number of names UBS will turn over to the IRS is likely to be lower than the numbers – up to 50,000 – tossed about earlier in 2009 by international media.
