30-4-103. Variation by agreement — measure of damages — action constituting ordinary care. (1) The effect of the provisions of this chapter may be varied by agreement, but the parties to the agreement may not disclaim a bank‘s responsibility for its own lack of good faith or failure to exercise ordinary care or limit the measure of damages for the lack or failure. However, the parties may determine by agreement the standards by which the bank’s responsibility is to be measured if those standards are not manifestly unreasonable.

Terms Used In Montana Code 30-4-103

  • bank: means any person engaged in the business of banking, including a savings bank, savings and loan association, credit union, or trust company;

    (2)"depositary bank" means the first bank to take an item even though it is also the payor bank, unless the item is presented for immediate payment over the counter;

    (3)"payor bank" means a bank that is the drawee of a draft;

    (4)"intermediary bank" means a bank to which an item is transferred in course of collection except the depositary or payor bank;

    (5)"collecting bank" means a bank handling an item for collection except the payor bank;

    (6)"presenting bank" means a bank presenting an item except a payor bank. See Montana Code 30-4-105

  • Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
  • Usage: means a reasonable and lawful public custom concerning transactions of the same nature as those which are to be affected thereby, existing at the place where the obligation is to be performed, and either known to the parties or so well established, general, and uniform that the parties must be presumed to have acted with reference thereto. See Montana Code 1-1-206

(2)Federal reserve regulations and operating circulars, clearinghouse rules, and the like, have the effect of agreements under subsection (1), whether or not specifically assented to by all parties interested in items handled.

(3)Action or nonaction approved by this chapter or pursuant to federal reserve regulations or operating circulars constitutes the exercise of ordinary care and, in the absence of special instructions, action or nonaction consistent with clearinghouse and similar rules or with a general banking usage not disapproved by this chapter, constitutes prima facie the exercise of ordinary care.

(4)The specification or approval of certain procedures by this chapter does not constitute disapproval of other procedures that may be reasonable under the circumstances.

(5)The measure of damages for failure to exercise ordinary care in handling an item is the amount of the item reduced by an amount that could not have been realized by the exercise of ordinary care. If there is also bad faith it includes any other damages the party suffered as a proximate consequence.