Yes, we believe that the checks for these accounts should reflect the exact account names. While we do not recommend that a bank interject itself into a trustee’s decisions when merely providing deposit accounts for a trust, we do recommend printing account checks that show the account owner’s name. In this case, the account owner is the trustee, not the trust’s grantors.
This approach avoids potential practical problems that could arise if checks are printed with the grantors’ names without an indication that the account is a trust account. For example, using the grantors’ names could result in confusion over whether the checks are drawn on the trust account or a separate account held by the grantors in their individual capacities, as well as exposure to possible disputes over whether the grantors are using trust funds for trust purposes. Even if these scenarios are unlikely in this scenario, we recommend establishing a consistent policy to avoid such problems for future trust deposit accounts.