新概念英语4册第12课

Banks and their customers

When anyone opens a current account at a bank, he is lending the bank money, repayment of which he may demand at any time, either in cash or by drawing a cheque in favour of another person. Primarily, the banker-customer relationship is that of debtor and creditor -- who is which depending on whether the customer`s account is in credit or is overdrawn. But, in addition to that basically simple concept, the bank and its customer owe a large number of obligations to one another. Many of these obligations can give rise to problems and complications but a bank customer, unlike, say, a buyer of goods, cannot complain that the law is loaded against him.

The bank must obey its customer`s instructions, and not those of anyone else. When, for example, a customer first opens an account, he instructs the bank to debit his account only in respect of cheques drawn by himself. He gives the bank specimens of his signature, and there is a very firm rule that bank has no right or authority to pay out a customer`s money on a cheque on which its customer`s signature has been forged. It makes no difference that the forgery may have been a very skillful one: the bank must recognize its customer`s signature.

For this reason there is no risk to the customer in the modern practice, adopted by some banks, of printing the customer`s name on his cheques. If this facilitates forgery it is the bank which will lose, not the customer.

当某个人在银行开了一个流通帐户，他是正在借银行的钱，他可以在任何需要的时候通过现金或者开支票偿还。根本上来说，银行--客户的关系是债务人和债主的关系--谁扮演何种角色是由拥护帐户是否透支决定的。但是，除了这层简单概念，银行与客户彼此之间还有很多义务和职责。这些职责常常上升为问题甚至抱怨。但银行客户与商品消费者不同，银行客户不能抱怨法律是站在他们对立面的。

银行必须遵守它给客户的说明，而不是其他任何东西。例如，当一个客户开了一个帐号，他给予银行权利仅能根据他支票上自己的签名从帐号上借钱。他留给银行自己的签名样本，并且严格的制度要求银行没有权利根据被伪造签名的支票付出客户的资金，即使伪造签名的技术十分高超，（规则）也没有什么不同。银行必须辩识出自己客户的签名。

由于这个原因，现今一些银行采用客户在支票背面签名的方法是没有风险的。如果（签名）被伪造则是银行的过失，而不是客户的。