Hi guys,

Here is the situation. I am in Rochester, NY and am dealing with a local M&T bank branch that is being a pain in the ass. Basically, I bought a 1998 Ford Taurus 7 years ago and took out a loan with this bank, so they had a lien on my car. I finished paying the loan off a couple of years ago. Now I am trying to sell my car before I go back to school because I want to buy a new one. The title on my car says that there is still a lien on it because it was never removed, therefore I am going to have a heck of a hard time selling my car, because no one is going to believe me that the car is, in fact, paid off.

Here's what you may be thinking: Why doesn't this idiot just go to the bank and ask them to give him a lien release letter saying that the car is, in fact, paid off? Well, I tried. I went in yesterday morning and they told me that there were two loan numbers on my account there and they couldn't tell which loan was for the Taurus, so they couldn't give me the lien release letter.

I then went home and dug up an old payment stub with the account number on it from 5 years ago. I take it into the bank this morning, and now they tell me that my loan record was purged from their system since it is so old, so they can't give me the letter. They tell me that they'll have to contact their records dept in Buffalo and have them dig up some proof that I paid the loan off in full so that they can give me the lien release letter. I am very pissed at this and tell them that I need this now. I tell them that I can't afford to wait 3 months for their [censored] department in Buffalo to get the paperwork for me and that this is gross incompetence on their part. They just shrug and I walk out of the bank steaming mad.

I come home and call up the New York State Banking dept and they tell me to fax them a complaint to NYC. I just did so about 15 minutes ago but I don't know how fast the banking dept will work. I really feel like suing them for something. I am wondering if any people familiar with the intricacies of banks can help me out. I just thought that the local banks had to keep the loan information on file. This [censored] just seems preposterous to me.

Thanks very much for reading this.