| "HOUSTON V. HOUSTON ET AL." CONTINUED |
THE REGULATORS
Customers of financial services in Canada are told they're protected from misconduct by a handful
of regulators. Banks are supposed to be overseen by the Ombudsman for Banking Services and
Investments (OBSI) located in Toronto, Ontario. In addition to OBSI there are at least two other
federal government agencies that oversee the banks, they are called the Office of the Superintendent
of Financial Institutions Canada, and the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (FCAC). Both are
in Ottawa, Ontario and neither federal office seem to accept complaints from consumers. FCAC
has told me victims of bank misconduct should seek redress through the bank's complaint process,
not through them. A complaint to the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Canada
about Bank of Montreal was not replied to.
The brokerage industry supposedly has at least three different agencies keeping a watchful eye on it.
OBSI, doing double-duty, also handles brokerage disputes. Then there's the Investment Dealers
Association of Canada (IDA) in Calgary, Alberta, and as well each province has its own brokerage
industry regulator, in BC it's the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) located in
Vancouver.
All major financial institutions in Canada are required by government legislation to have an internal
ombudsman in place who investigates customer complaints. The customer is told that the
ombudsman will conduct a fair review of the complaint and issue a recommendation in a timely
manner. If a grievance can't be satisfactorily resolved through the institution's ombudsman you can
then escalate your complaint to OBSI. You have to first receive a decision from the bank/brokerage
ombudsman before going to the Ombudsman for Banking Services and Investments.
This process doesn't exist. It's a lie. The claims of dispute resolution procedures being in place are
just ad agency marketing, government and bank propaganda. While the banks do have an employee
in place operating under the ombudsman title, this individual is not a bona fide ombudsman and does
not conduct impartial investigations into complaints. The internal ombudsman acts like in-house
legal counsel for the institution, he's not a mediator of any kind. The internal ombudsman isn't there
to assist the customer, he's opposed to the customer, he's there to block the customer and buffer the
company from complaints. The ombudsman is totally biased against the client. He's positioned to
serve his employer, the financial institution.
And the outside regulators are the same, they're all marketing and PR. The advertising campaigns
are false. The pamphlets and the websites and radio and print ads are very colorful and they look
very impressive when they tell Canadians how these agencies are there to protect them. However,
like Canada's justice system, the regulators are a massive fraud on the taxpayer who funds them.
The offices are shell operations that appear to be government patronage handouts only, not serving
any actual purpose for the consumer. They don't help the victim of financial services fraud, that's
for sure. Rather these agencies are a wall of obstruction shielding the financial institutions from the
complaints of those assailed by their misconduct. They're there to support the financial services
sector, the banks and the brokerages. They're not there to support the victim of financial services
fraud.
The regulators all use a common method to obstruct the victim of financial services misconduct.
They all do it the same way. This is what I encountered: The grievance is filed. The regulator may
issue a statement that the matter will be assessed. (BCSC on the other hand immediately says they
will not look into your complaint, no questions asked.) Months later a statement is remitted stating
the regulator sees no impropriety, or lacks jurisdiction to deal with the matter, some excuse, and the
file is closed. And so is the door. At this point the regulator slams the door shut. You're frozen out
and you're expected to go away and never return. The regulator now refuses to receive any further
grievances. The regulator will not address them. We've already reviewed the matter, they'll say.
They say that even if the subsequent complaints have nothing to do with the previous ones. You've
become persona non grata to the financial services regulators in Canada just for reporting
misconduct.
As a victim of overwhelming bank and brokerage fraud, the Ombudsman for Banking Services and
Investments was for me a useless dead end. I've repeatedly attempted to report bank and brokerage
fraud to OBSI but OBSI ceased replying to my grievances long ago. OBSI closed its doors and will
no longer accept complaints from me.
I discovered that diverting internal bank and brokerage fraud to OBSI is a financial services industry
obstruction tactic. The government has set up this process so banks and brokerages can evade
responsibility for abusing clients. And the banks and brokerages will use this obstruction scheme to
get them off the hook when they are guilty of major criminal fraud against a customer. The bank or
brokerage will tell the fraud victim to take their grievance(s) to OBSI, even when the financial
institution is clearly guilty of major criminal fraud activity that should be reported as crime to the
police.
The reason banks and brokerages tell the fraud victim to report misconduct to OBSI is because they
know that (a) OBSI does not assist victims of financial fraud perpetrated by financial institutions and
that (b) OBSI's recommendations are NOT BINDING and the banks and brokerages are not legally
obligated by law to comply with any recommendations made by OBSI. So, while a
recommendation found in the victimized client's favor by OBSI is not a binding recommendation
that the bank or brokerage must comply with, the misconduct of the financial services industry
company is binding. That's why banks and brokerages instruct aggrieved clients to report their
misconduct to OBSI -- it doesn't matter. The banks and brokerages don't have to listen to OBSI.
There are no consequences for banks and brokerages even if OBSI finds that a financial services
company conducted itself improperly and contrary to the law, which is very unlikely. In my
experience OBSI will not make the finding that a bank is guilty of misconduct. In fact, OBSI won't
even take complaints from me.
A non-binding dispute resolution office that can refuse to accept complaints from fraud victims is
not a regulatory system. What this means is that, while brokerages are supposedly regulated by
provincial securities commissions, banks are not regulated in any way by the government in Canada.
This leaves only the police to regulate bank fraud and the police don't accept bank fraud complaints
either. The government has placed the banks in a position where they can do whatever they want
to vulnerable customers and there's no one who can stop them.
The misconduct I experienced with the British Columbia Securities Commission wasn't much
different from my experience with OBSI.
Here's my appalling experience with the British Columbia Securities Commission. I filed complaints
with BCSC dated December 12, 2006, December 13, 2006 and December 14, 2006 against BMO
Nesbitt Burns Inc., TD Waterhouse Discount Brokerage, and Bank of Montreal (a public company)
respectively. BCSC formally declined, in writing, to review the complaints. I was informed by
William W. Ting that BCSC does not investigate brokerages. The brokerage complaints would
instead be shunted to Alberta for review by IDA and the Bank of Montreal grievance would be
diverted out of the province to OBSI. All complaints received by BCSC against members of IDA
(brokerage firms) are automatically delegated to IDA for assessment. Ting made it very clear BCSC
does not address misconduct at brokerages. Not BCSC's jurisdiction. Ting explained that BCSC,
as the senior regulator of the British Columbia capital markets, acts as an appeal board for IDA
decisions and I could appeal their assessments at BCSC by way of a written application.
BCSC sent me up the garden path. Parroting the BCSC line, IDA would not address the ongoing
misconduct I reported. Big surprise.
After the three initial complaints I lodged two more unique fraud beefs against BMO Nesbitt Burns
with BCSC. By this time the commission had shut its doors. Knock knock. Hello? Anyone in
there? Ting vanished, my letters weren't replied to, grievances were no longer forwarded to third
parties for review. Where'd BCSC go? About four months later I received a terse two-line letter
from BCSC employee Romolo Di Fonzo saying Ting had already reviewed the BMO Nesbitt Burns
matter and the filed was closed. BCSC would take no further action. Goodbye Mr. Houston.
Further action? They hadn't taken any action period. BCSC would not accept new complaints.
The commission was obstructing me. I wrote to Di Fonzo reminding BCSC that it had reviewed
nothing, instead the complaints had been forwarded to third parties for review. If Ting had
reviewed the material, I told BCSC, he hadn't forwarded his reviews to me. I asked that BCSC
send me the missing reviews and I asked for applications to engage the appeal process Ting had told
me about. BCSC has no right to pre-judge the merits of the matters brought to its attention based
solely on who's writing them. That's called discrimination. Attached was another unique, never
before reported complaint against BMO Nesbitt Burns. Unique like a snowflake. No answer. I
filed another unique incident of fraud. No answer. I filed another.
Finally on October 18, 2007 Di Fonzo issued a second statement. Romolo Di Fonzo said only IDA
members (brokerages) convicted of wrongdoing can appeal an IDA decision, not those devastated
by securities fraud in British Columbia. The missing reviews Di Fonzo claimed were processed by
Ting weren't attached. Of course they weren't. Ting didn't review anything.
Attached to the letter though was an unusual and noteworthy message.
For some unknown reason attached to Di Fonzo's letter was something called a Case Details View
Report, apparently authored by Ting. The document appeared to be an internal BCSC record. The
document was not a misconduct review. The report addressed an individual, single December 12,
2006 BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. complaint and nothing more. The report's summary indicated BCSC
believed BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. was acting on an order of the court when it released $787,169.07
of liquidated Powell River Investments Ltd. (a company I own) capital to PwC in 2005. According
to BCSC this massive money laundering and fraud event was conducted legally, pursuant to a court
judgment rendered by the Ministry of Attorney General, and was executed in compliance with the
law. BCSC was saying this illegal payoff was ordered by the Government of British Columbia!
BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc.'s conduct raised no red flags for BCSC, the activity is acceptable, it's cool,
nothing for the commission or the government to concern itself with. Ting went on to dismiss BMO
Financial Group's criminal actions as "largely a civil dispute between family members."
A civil dispute between family members?
What I reported is not civil litigation. I'm not involved in a lawsuit with BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc.
The companies in receivership didn't get ripped off by my sister or by my father or by my mother.
BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. isn't a member of my family. What I reported is securities fraud. And,
contrary to Ting's bewildering assertion, no court judgment exists ordering any of the criminal
transactions.
Interestingly, the Case Details View Report tells us how, even though the matter was prioritized by
BCSC as "High," the case was opened and rapidly closed without investigation faster than anyone
could scream, "SECURITIES FRAUD!!!" It was whitewashed and hushed up. According to the
Case Details View Report, the file was perfunctorily opened on Thursday, December 14, 2006 and
summarily slammed shut barely two business days later, on Monday, December 18, 2006. A high
priority incident of colossal securities fraud is reported to the British Columbia Securities
Commission and the commission's instinctual reaction was to immediately cover up the reported
criminal activity.
BCSC's processing of the complaint was merely superficial. In actual fact this file wasn't opened at
all. Ting's statement was nonsense. He's confused. He obviously doesn't understand legal
procedure and refuses, or is unable, to acknowledge securities fraud when it's staring him in the
face. Since William Ting had already demonstrated he failed to comprehend the appeal process of
his employer, the British Columbia Securities Commission, it was impossible to take his Case Details
View Report seriously. Ting's statement was a cop-out, a load of incompetent hogwash that
allowed BCSC to evade its duties and avoid taking action on the very serious matter.
I'd used the jargon "dispute resolution mechanism" in a letter to BCSC. Di Fonzo jumped on my
use of the term, telling me it meant I misunderstand the role of BCSC. Di Fonzo's lame excuse is
often heard when unpleasant facts are brought to the government's attention. I may have misused
terminology but that doesn't mean I don't know what a securities commission is supposed to do.
My understanding is this: BCSC's PR and marketing tells people the commission is responsible for
enforcing the Securities Act in BC. BCSC's advertising boasts of how the commission can
investigate and act against misconduct such as theft and fraud perpetrated by companies in the
business of selling securities. I had never asked the British Columbia Securities Commission to act
as an advocate for me in a dispute with a brokerage, as Di Fonzo implied. I was simply reporting
numerous persistent and substantial occurrences of securities fraud in the brokerage industry in BC.
As I write this account, December 2007, eight individually distinct incidents of fraud have been
lodged with BCSC against BMO Financial Group and TD Bank Financial Group. None of these
grievances have received review by the British Columbia Securities Commission. That ain't cool.
That ain't cool at all.
The BC Securities Commission is a taxpayer-funded shell operation that exists in name only. BCSC
is not a competently functioning operation. It does not protect consumers from fraud.
Customers of financial services in Canada are told they're protected from misconduct by a handful
of regulators. Banks are supposed to be overseen by the Ombudsman for Banking Services and
Investments (OBSI) located in Toronto, Ontario. In addition to OBSI there are at least two other
federal government agencies that oversee the banks, they are called the Office of the Superintendent
of Financial Institutions Canada, and the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (FCAC). Both are
in Ottawa, Ontario and neither federal office seem to accept complaints from consumers. FCAC
has told me victims of bank misconduct should seek redress through the bank's complaint process,
not through them. A complaint to the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Canada
about Bank of Montreal was not replied to.
The brokerage industry supposedly has at least three different agencies keeping a watchful eye on it.
OBSI, doing double-duty, also handles brokerage disputes. Then there's the Investment Dealers
Association of Canada (IDA) in Calgary, Alberta, and as well each province has its own brokerage
industry regulator, in BC it's the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) located in
Vancouver.
All major financial institutions in Canada are required by government legislation to have an internal
ombudsman in place who investigates customer complaints. The customer is told that the
ombudsman will conduct a fair review of the complaint and issue a recommendation in a timely
manner. If a grievance can't be satisfactorily resolved through the institution's ombudsman you can
then escalate your complaint to OBSI. You have to first receive a decision from the bank/brokerage
ombudsman before going to the Ombudsman for Banking Services and Investments.
This process doesn't exist. It's a lie. The claims of dispute resolution procedures being in place are
just ad agency marketing, government and bank propaganda. While the banks do have an employee
in place operating under the ombudsman title, this individual is not a bona fide ombudsman and does
not conduct impartial investigations into complaints. The internal ombudsman acts like in-house
legal counsel for the institution, he's not a mediator of any kind. The internal ombudsman isn't there
to assist the customer, he's opposed to the customer, he's there to block the customer and buffer the
company from complaints. The ombudsman is totally biased against the client. He's positioned to
serve his employer, the financial institution.
And the outside regulators are the same, they're all marketing and PR. The advertising campaigns
are false. The pamphlets and the websites and radio and print ads are very colorful and they look
very impressive when they tell Canadians how these agencies are there to protect them. However,
like Canada's justice system, the regulators are a massive fraud on the taxpayer who funds them.
The offices are shell operations that appear to be government patronage handouts only, not serving
any actual purpose for the consumer. They don't help the victim of financial services fraud, that's
for sure. Rather these agencies are a wall of obstruction shielding the financial institutions from the
complaints of those assailed by their misconduct. They're there to support the financial services
sector, the banks and the brokerages. They're not there to support the victim of financial services
fraud.
The regulators all use a common method to obstruct the victim of financial services misconduct.
They all do it the same way. This is what I encountered: The grievance is filed. The regulator may
issue a statement that the matter will be assessed. (BCSC on the other hand immediately says they
will not look into your complaint, no questions asked.) Months later a statement is remitted stating
the regulator sees no impropriety, or lacks jurisdiction to deal with the matter, some excuse, and the
file is closed. And so is the door. At this point the regulator slams the door shut. You're frozen out
and you're expected to go away and never return. The regulator now refuses to receive any further
grievances. The regulator will not address them. We've already reviewed the matter, they'll say.
They say that even if the subsequent complaints have nothing to do with the previous ones. You've
become persona non grata to the financial services regulators in Canada just for reporting
misconduct.
As a victim of overwhelming bank and brokerage fraud, the Ombudsman for Banking Services and
Investments was for me a useless dead end. I've repeatedly attempted to report bank and brokerage
fraud to OBSI but OBSI ceased replying to my grievances long ago. OBSI closed its doors and will
no longer accept complaints from me.
I discovered that diverting internal bank and brokerage fraud to OBSI is a financial services industry
obstruction tactic. The government has set up this process so banks and brokerages can evade
responsibility for abusing clients. And the banks and brokerages will use this obstruction scheme to
get them off the hook when they are guilty of major criminal fraud against a customer. The bank or
brokerage will tell the fraud victim to take their grievance(s) to OBSI, even when the financial
institution is clearly guilty of major criminal fraud activity that should be reported as crime to the
police.
The reason banks and brokerages tell the fraud victim to report misconduct to OBSI is because they
know that (a) OBSI does not assist victims of financial fraud perpetrated by financial institutions and
that (b) OBSI's recommendations are NOT BINDING and the banks and brokerages are not legally
obligated by law to comply with any recommendations made by OBSI. So, while a
recommendation found in the victimized client's favor by OBSI is not a binding recommendation
that the bank or brokerage must comply with, the misconduct of the financial services industry
company is binding. That's why banks and brokerages instruct aggrieved clients to report their
misconduct to OBSI -- it doesn't matter. The banks and brokerages don't have to listen to OBSI.
There are no consequences for banks and brokerages even if OBSI finds that a financial services
company conducted itself improperly and contrary to the law, which is very unlikely. In my
experience OBSI will not make the finding that a bank is guilty of misconduct. In fact, OBSI won't
even take complaints from me.
A non-binding dispute resolution office that can refuse to accept complaints from fraud victims is
not a regulatory system. What this means is that, while brokerages are supposedly regulated by
provincial securities commissions, banks are not regulated in any way by the government in Canada.
This leaves only the police to regulate bank fraud and the police don't accept bank fraud complaints
either. The government has placed the banks in a position where they can do whatever they want
to vulnerable customers and there's no one who can stop them.
The misconduct I experienced with the British Columbia Securities Commission wasn't much
different from my experience with OBSI.
Here's my appalling experience with the British Columbia Securities Commission. I filed complaints
with BCSC dated December 12, 2006, December 13, 2006 and December 14, 2006 against BMO
Nesbitt Burns Inc., TD Waterhouse Discount Brokerage, and Bank of Montreal (a public company)
respectively. BCSC formally declined, in writing, to review the complaints. I was informed by
William W. Ting that BCSC does not investigate brokerages. The brokerage complaints would
instead be shunted to Alberta for review by IDA and the Bank of Montreal grievance would be
diverted out of the province to OBSI. All complaints received by BCSC against members of IDA
(brokerage firms) are automatically delegated to IDA for assessment. Ting made it very clear BCSC
does not address misconduct at brokerages. Not BCSC's jurisdiction. Ting explained that BCSC,
as the senior regulator of the British Columbia capital markets, acts as an appeal board for IDA
decisions and I could appeal their assessments at BCSC by way of a written application.
BCSC sent me up the garden path. Parroting the BCSC line, IDA would not address the ongoing
misconduct I reported. Big surprise.
After the three initial complaints I lodged two more unique fraud beefs against BMO Nesbitt Burns
with BCSC. By this time the commission had shut its doors. Knock knock. Hello? Anyone in
there? Ting vanished, my letters weren't replied to, grievances were no longer forwarded to third
parties for review. Where'd BCSC go? About four months later I received a terse two-line letter
from BCSC employee Romolo Di Fonzo saying Ting had already reviewed the BMO Nesbitt Burns
matter and the filed was closed. BCSC would take no further action. Goodbye Mr. Houston.
Further action? They hadn't taken any action period. BCSC would not accept new complaints.
The commission was obstructing me. I wrote to Di Fonzo reminding BCSC that it had reviewed
nothing, instead the complaints had been forwarded to third parties for review. If Ting had
reviewed the material, I told BCSC, he hadn't forwarded his reviews to me. I asked that BCSC
send me the missing reviews and I asked for applications to engage the appeal process Ting had told
me about. BCSC has no right to pre-judge the merits of the matters brought to its attention based
solely on who's writing them. That's called discrimination. Attached was another unique, never
before reported complaint against BMO Nesbitt Burns. Unique like a snowflake. No answer. I
filed another unique incident of fraud. No answer. I filed another.
Finally on October 18, 2007 Di Fonzo issued a second statement. Romolo Di Fonzo said only IDA
members (brokerages) convicted of wrongdoing can appeal an IDA decision, not those devastated
by securities fraud in British Columbia. The missing reviews Di Fonzo claimed were processed by
Ting weren't attached. Of course they weren't. Ting didn't review anything.
Attached to the letter though was an unusual and noteworthy message.
For some unknown reason attached to Di Fonzo's letter was something called a Case Details View
Report, apparently authored by Ting. The document appeared to be an internal BCSC record. The
document was not a misconduct review. The report addressed an individual, single December 12,
2006 BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. complaint and nothing more. The report's summary indicated BCSC
believed BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. was acting on an order of the court when it released $787,169.07
of liquidated Powell River Investments Ltd. (a company I own) capital to PwC in 2005. According
to BCSC this massive money laundering and fraud event was conducted legally, pursuant to a court
judgment rendered by the Ministry of Attorney General, and was executed in compliance with the
law. BCSC was saying this illegal payoff was ordered by the Government of British Columbia!
BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc.'s conduct raised no red flags for BCSC, the activity is acceptable, it's cool,
nothing for the commission or the government to concern itself with. Ting went on to dismiss BMO
Financial Group's criminal actions as "largely a civil dispute between family members."
A civil dispute between family members?
What I reported is not civil litigation. I'm not involved in a lawsuit with BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc.
The companies in receivership didn't get ripped off by my sister or by my father or by my mother.
BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. isn't a member of my family. What I reported is securities fraud. And,
contrary to Ting's bewildering assertion, no court judgment exists ordering any of the criminal
transactions.
Interestingly, the Case Details View Report tells us how, even though the matter was prioritized by
BCSC as "High," the case was opened and rapidly closed without investigation faster than anyone
could scream, "SECURITIES FRAUD!!!" It was whitewashed and hushed up. According to the
Case Details View Report, the file was perfunctorily opened on Thursday, December 14, 2006 and
summarily slammed shut barely two business days later, on Monday, December 18, 2006. A high
priority incident of colossal securities fraud is reported to the British Columbia Securities
Commission and the commission's instinctual reaction was to immediately cover up the reported
criminal activity.
BCSC's processing of the complaint was merely superficial. In actual fact this file wasn't opened at
all. Ting's statement was nonsense. He's confused. He obviously doesn't understand legal
procedure and refuses, or is unable, to acknowledge securities fraud when it's staring him in the
face. Since William Ting had already demonstrated he failed to comprehend the appeal process of
his employer, the British Columbia Securities Commission, it was impossible to take his Case Details
View Report seriously. Ting's statement was a cop-out, a load of incompetent hogwash that
allowed BCSC to evade its duties and avoid taking action on the very serious matter.
I'd used the jargon "dispute resolution mechanism" in a letter to BCSC. Di Fonzo jumped on my
use of the term, telling me it meant I misunderstand the role of BCSC. Di Fonzo's lame excuse is
often heard when unpleasant facts are brought to the government's attention. I may have misused
terminology but that doesn't mean I don't know what a securities commission is supposed to do.
My understanding is this: BCSC's PR and marketing tells people the commission is responsible for
enforcing the Securities Act in BC. BCSC's advertising boasts of how the commission can
investigate and act against misconduct such as theft and fraud perpetrated by companies in the
business of selling securities. I had never asked the British Columbia Securities Commission to act
as an advocate for me in a dispute with a brokerage, as Di Fonzo implied. I was simply reporting
numerous persistent and substantial occurrences of securities fraud in the brokerage industry in BC.
As I write this account, December 2007, eight individually distinct incidents of fraud have been
lodged with BCSC against BMO Financial Group and TD Bank Financial Group. None of these
grievances have received review by the British Columbia Securities Commission. That ain't cool.
That ain't cool at all.
The BC Securities Commission is a taxpayer-funded shell operation that exists in name only. BCSC
is not a competently functioning operation. It does not protect consumers from fraud.
18 / 45