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Put all
this against the background of “An Account at Martins Bank”, and you will
see that the Bank is not simply touting for business, it is trying to
persuade huge numbers of ordinary people that conducting a banking
account IS for them, and it
is also safe and easy to do…
Why you need a Banking account
  It is not necessary to be
rich to have a banking account, but more and more people are beginning to appreciate the wisdom
of keeping their money in a bank where it is absolutely safe from loss.
Martins Bank offers you a first class banking service whether you are
wage-earning, salaried or of independent means. Let us tell you about it.
 There
are two main ways in which a banking account can be of great help; in the
first place, as an orderly and systematic way of conducting your affairs,
and secondly as a means of saving. Similarly,
there are two main types of account you can open at a bank, a current
account and a deposit account. The first is the usual type of account into
which you can pay the money you receive and out of which you can draw cash
as you require it or pay your various outgoings by cheque. For instance,
you can pay in your salary cheque each month or arrange for it to be
credited direct, or you can pay in money from your weekly wages and any
other cheques or dividends you may receive; and all your outgoings such as
coal, gas, electricity, rent, rates, taxes, insurance premiums, hire
purchase instalments and so on can be paid by cheque. Or, if you are a
housewife, you can pay in your housekeeping allowance and settle your
accounts at the various shops by cheque. The bank keeps a proper statement
of the account and any time you wish to know your exact position you can
ask for this statement or it can be sent to you by post. In one column you
will see all the amounts paid in and in another all the amounts paid out,
the remaining balance being clearly shown. This enables you to have a
complete record of your financial affairs and to know where your money has
gone, and that is a big step towards saving some of it. You can, if you
wish, have a separate account for your savings which will earn interest:
this is a “deposit account” and you can, of course, open an
account of this kind even if you feel you do not need a current account.
There is no charge for keeping a deposit account.
In view of the work involved in operating a current account, the manager
may find it necessary to make a small charge in some cases, but he will be
glad to explain why, when you call upon him. If you call on, or write to, the Manager of any of the Bank's
branches, he will be pleased to give you full details and help you to
decide which type of account will suit your needs.
Home Safe accounts
The Bank also opens
savings, or “Home Safe”
accounts. The “safe” is in the form of a little book into which odd coins
may be slipped. It can be emptied at the Bank and the amount entered into
the bank book. Such accounts bear a special rate of interest.
Your cheques cashed
The Bank will arrange for
you to cash your cheques anywhere in the country where there is a bank,
either at one of our branches or at a branch of one of the other banks.
Insurance premiums club
subscriptions
and other regular payments
Martins Bank will, if
desired, pay your insurance premiums, club subscriptions and other regular
payments when they become due.
Investment service
If you want help or advice
about investments, our Managers will gladly obtain for you advice from the
experts in such matters.
Foreign currency and Travellers' Cheques
If you go abroad the Bank
will supply foreign currency and travellers' cheques which can be exchanged
for foreign currency.
Your Income Tax
The Bank will also attend
to your Income Tax affairs.
Your Will
The Bank will act as
Executor or Trustee for you.
A reference supplied
They
will also supply a reference for you, a useful facility if you are applying
for a passport, or opening a shopping or credit account.
Your valuables guarded
 The
Bank provides accommodation in their strong rooms and safes for your deeds,
share certificates, or other documents of value; and for locked boxes or
sealed parcels containing jewellery or other valuables. In all these
matters strict secrecy is observed and your affairs will not be divulged to
any other person, relation or otherwise, without your knowledge and
permission.
Personal
loans
Martins will grant personal
loans for important items of expenditure. Usually no security will be
required as the integrity and character of the borrower and ability to meet
the regular repayment instalments are the deciding factors. This is a
simple and advantageous way of raising a lump sum of money. Please ask for
a copy of our Personal Loans Leaflet, which gives full details of the
facilities. All these
advantages are yours as the possessor of a banking account, current or
deposit. In addition, at any time you may draw upon the experience and
knowledge of your bank manager and his friendly help and guidance without
obligation. All you need to do is make an appointment with him or write to
him.
A word about Martins
 At
this point we ought to try to tell you something about ourselves. Martins
Bank operates over 600 branches throughout England, Wales, the Channel Isles
and the Isle of Man. The Bank started as the Bank of Liverpool over 125
years ago but the old private bank, Martin's Bank, London, which became
part of the larger bank in 1918, dates back to 1563—and the grasshopper in the Bank's coat of
arms is the emblem which Sir Thomas Gresham, the famous Elizabethan
financier, displayed outside his house in Lombard Street, where our
principal London office now stands, and where banking business has been done
without a break since the sixteenth century. Incidentally, the bird which
is prominently displayed on
our coat of arms is the Liver Bird of Liverpool.
 The
constant aim of our managers and every member of our staff is the
maintenance of a friendly personal relationship with every customer, whose
presence in the bank is always welcomed whether he has £1 or £1,000 in his account. Again and again our customers tell us "Martins
Bank is such a friendly bank" and we train our staff in the tradition
of the family, all working together for what is, in many respects, a great
public service. It is also of interest to
note that in the course of our growth we have absorbed or amalgamated with
over thirty smaller banks, many of them family concerns steeped in the same
excellent tradition. We hope, after what
we have said, that you will feel that we have something to offer you and
you will now want to know how to set about opening your account and how to
conduct it.
How to open an account
Any adult person can open
an account by walking into any branch and asking to see the Manager. If he
is not available, the cashier can handle the routine details equally well.
Accounts can also be opened for those who are not yet 21, students and
young people, maybe but not necessarily living away from home and who can
appreciate the responsibilities entailed in having a cheque book. The procedure is perfectly simple: you will be asked
for your full name and address, a reference, and a specimen of your signature
so that the officials of the bank may familiarise themselves with it and
have it available for comparison when necessary. The person to whom
reference may be made must be someone who knows you. This can be discussed
at the time of opening the account and the Manager will guide you as to who
is a suitable person. You will appreciate that asking for a reference is a
general safeguard of the banking system before a book is issued.
Paying money in
 After
the formalities have been completed the thing to do is to place a sum of
money to the credit of the newly-opened account. The sum need only be a few
pounds, and indeed many of our customers start in a very small way.
You can have a paying-in
book if you wish and, as counterfoils are provided, you can keep a record
of all sums you pay in and check them off against your statement of account
from time to time. Some people use the loose credit notes provided in the
boxes at the counter and these are supplied without counterfoils. Many people do not counterfoils but you
may prefer to have one which the cashier will stamp and return to you when
he receives your money.
You can pay in cheques,
money orders, orders and dividend warrants as well as cash, and you can pay
in at any branch of any bank as well as your own, so long as you remember
to put the name of your own bank and branch on the credit note in addition
to the name of the account to be credited. The receiving bank will send it
to your bank the same day.
The use of a cheque book
The
Bank makes no charge for a cheque book, but collects the value of the stamp
duty of 2d. to which each cheque is liable and hands it over to the Revenue
Authorities. Cheques for current accounts are made up in books of twelve
costing 2/-, twenty-four costing 4/-, or in larger sizes to suit
requirements. The use of a cheque avoids the necessity of carrying large
sums of cash about with you and provides a convenient record of the
payments you make from your balance in the Bank. You can give cheques to nearly
everyone to whom you owe money. You also, of course, use a cheque to get
money from your account for
yourself and, as we have mentioned earlier in this booklet, one of the
great advantages of
having a banking account is that we can arrange for you to draw cash
yourself at any branch of any bank in the British Isles. This is an additional convenience if you
are staying in a place where we have no branch of our own. You have to sign each cheque, as this is
your authority to us to pay it, and it must also be dated and the name of
the person or firm who is to receive the money written upon it;
and, of course, the amount
which must be both in words and figures. This latter proviso is a safeguard
against the accidental insertion of a wrong amount. When filling in your cheques there are a few
simple rules to be observed for both your protection -
and ours.
1.
Please
always write your cheques in ink…
2. Start writing as far over to the left-hand side
as possible and do not leave spaces between words. The same remarks apply
to figures. Remember that 'seven' could be altered to 'seventy' and '£7' to '£70' if
space is left. Draw a line through any blank space on your cheque…
3. If you make a mistake, alter it in a legible way
preferably by crossing it out and re-writing the altered word or figure,
and sign your name against each alteration…
4. Always sign in the same manner as you did when
you gave the specimen of your signature on opening your account, otherwise
its correctness may be queried…
5. Remember to fill in the counterfoil. Not only is this
a record of the cheques you issue to keep you up to date with your
financial position, but you can check the counterfoils against your bank statement and should a
cheque be lost or for any reason you wish to stop payment of it, you will
have the exact details to give to the Bank…
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