Yes, we believe these accounts would be protected from your customer’s creditors, as any other escrow (or trust) account would be protected. Your customer’s creditors would not be permitted to reach these accounts, which are not your customer’s property — the funds would belong to the truckers, for whom your customer is holding the funds in some type of fiduciary capacity.

For deposit insurance purposes, we recommend titling the escrow accounts in a manner that indicates the agency nature of your customer’s relationship with the truckers. When a business is acting as an agent (or in some other fiduciary-like capacity), and that relationship is clearly established in the deposit account records, the fiduciary accounts are entitled to separate deposit insurance coverage.

For resources related to our guidance, please see:

• Garvey v. Parrish, 84 Ill.App.3d 578, 583 (1st Dist. 1980) (“The garnishor has the burden of showing that the garnishee holds property belonging to the judgment debtor. Garnishment can reach only a judgment debtor’s property, not property which he holds in trust for others.”)

• FDIC Deposit Insurance Rules, 12 CFR 330.5(b) (“The FDIC will recognize a claim for insurance coverage based on a fiduciary relationship only if the relationship is expressly disclosed, by way of specific references, in the ‘deposit account records’ . . . of the insured depository institution. Such relationships include, but are not limited to, relationships involving a trustee, agent, nominee, guardian, executor or custodian pursuant to which funds are deposited. . . .”)

• FDIC-88-81  (Opining that if a bank “maintains records (in good faith and in the regular course of business) which show the name and ownership interest of each property owner in the account” then separate property management accounts would be insured up to the maximum amount for each property owner.)