Second National Bank v. Thompson

Citations

• 44 Pa. Super. 200
• 1910 Pa. Super. LEXIS 150

Syllabus

<p>Banks and banking — Deposits—Statute of limitations.</p> <p>1. The engagement of a bank with its depositor is not to pay absolutely and immediately, but only when payment shall be requested or demanded at the banking house. Until such demand is made the statute of limitations does not begin to run in favor of the bank and against the depositor. The fact that the depositor has had the account in the deposit book balanced does not affect the applicability of the rule.</p> <p>Banks and banking — Two accounts by the same depositor — Account stated.</p> <p>2. Where a depositor of a bank opens a second and separate account for which she receives a new deposit book and the depositor is not required to surrender the old book, and afterwards she ceases to draw on the old account and only uses the new account, a subsequent balancing of the new account and return of the vouchers, without anything to indicate that the new account was a continuation of the old one, has not the effect of an account stated as against a balance due upon the old account.</p> <p>Banks and banking — Deposit—Presumption of payment — Evidence.</p> <p>3. In an action against a bank to recover a balance, a presumption of payment after twenty years is rebutted by the positive and uncontradicted testimony of the depositor that the balance claimed had never been paid by the bank or any part of it drawn out by the depositor. In such a case the case is for the jury to pass upon the credibility of the testimony of the depositor.</p> <p>4. The presumption which the law raises after a lapse of twenty years is in its nature essentially different from the bar interposed by the statute of limitations to the recovery of a simple contract debt. The latter is a prohibition of the action; the former prima facie of obliteration of the debt. The presumption is equal to direct proof of payment, and it will prevail until overcome by direct proof of nonpayment, or the proof of facts and circumstances from which nonpayment