Medallion

Yes, in most cases.* If you need a Medallion Signature Guarantee or you have customers or clients who are transferring assets and your institution or firm does not provide the Medallion Signature Guarantee or cannot provide the guarantee because the assets are transferring to another institution, we will be happy to assist. Furthermore, you have our assurance that we will not interfere in any way with the transaction you may be attempting, though we may be obligated to provide our Disclosure Brochure, which explains to recipients who our firm is.

No. For our clients or soon to be clients of any division, accounting, financial planning, venture capital, or investment advisory, there is no charge for a Medallion Signature Guarantee.

If you’re unaware, a Medallion Signature Guarantee is a special signature guarantee for the transfer of securities whereby the verifying financial institution accepts liability that:

1. The signature is genuine, AND
2. The signer has legal authority to sign the document guaranteed, AND
3. The signer has capacity.

Because of the liability associated with such a Medallion Signature Guarantee, most financial institutions are moving towards only guaranteeing signatures for the transfer of assets to their institution; many will not even guarantee their own customers signatures if the guaranteed assets are transferring to another institution. In short, most institutions are limiting the availability to this service because they do not have a cost effective way to provide it and still limit their liability.

1. Before coming by our office, we recommend calling to schedule an appointment. We are happy to accept walk-ins, however, a very limited number of persons on our staff have the ability to provide the Medallion Signature Guarantee. So, we hate for you to make a trip for no reason if our staff that will provide the guarantee are unavailable for any reason.
2. Bring the signer and do not sign the document until you are in our presence! While it may seem obvious, we cannot guarantee a signature that we do not witness.
3. Bring the minimal required documents for verification of your identity. As a minimum, this will be:
   1. Two forms of identification, each of which must include one of the following:
      1. A signature that has been digitized (e.g. Driver’s License)
      2. A photo identification that also includes your name (e.g. Student ID, Work ID, etc.)
   2. A copy of your most recent statement for the assets being transferred.
4. Bring other supporting documentation. In many instances, we will need to document other items to confirm that you are the legal signer or that you have authority to sign. These may be documents such as a power of attorney, divorce decree, etc. While we can’t tell you what each of these may be, it is a good idea to bring any documentation supporting that “you are who you say you are” and that “you have authority to sign the document”.

First, as a small firm, our principles (owners) are close to the local relationships for signatures being verified and we have complete confidence in our own ability to fact find, document, examine, and reach a legal conclusion regarding the signatures we guarantee. It is difficult for a multinational conglomerate, far removed from a local staff member with uncertainty about such a staff member’s ability in these matters to be as confident. Therefore, such entities most often limit such risk by limiting who they choose to serve.

Furthermore, as you are probably aware, Eddleman & Eddleman is a boutique firm offering a very high level of services in accounting, financial planning, investment, and venture capital advice and implementation. While one of these areas of advisement may compete with certain financial services professionals (you or yours), most firms do not offer every one of these financial services. We don’t have to be everything to everybody. We’re more than happy to help you or your client in providing the highest level of service and maybe the next time you or your client needs assistance with something, you’ll consider the care, dedication, and cooperation provided by us in helping obtain a Medallion Signature Guarantee. Just consider it a trial run introduction on how we like to work in serving clients through cooperation rather than competition!

Generally, the fee is $99 per signature guaranteed for non-Eddleman clients; however, under certain circumstances requiring additional investigation, documentation, or verification, we may have to charge more due to the additional time and liability involved. But, we will let you know in advance if it will be more. Documents requiring more than one signatory to be verified or transfers completed in a series will incur an additional $99 fee for each signature verified.

No and yes. Technically, we can facilitate the transfer of an account of any size. However, accounts in excess of $100,000 will have to be transferred in a series of transactions for which each transaction does not exceed the $100,000 limit. We cannot provide a Medallion Signature Guarantee for transactions over $100,000.

We do reserve the right to refuse to guarantee the signature of any individual at our sole discretion. If we cannot sufficiently verify you AND your legal authority AND your legal capacity to our satisfaction, we will not guarantee your document.