No, a private investigator cannot get bank records belonging to someone else on their own. Federal law makes it a crime to obtain a person’s bank account information by lying to a bank, and investigators have only one narrow, court-ordered exception. A private investigator can get bank records lawfully only with the account holder’s consent or through legal process.
The law is the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. 15 U.S.C. 6821 makes it a violation to obtain, or try to obtain, a financial institution’s customer information about another person by lying to a bank employee or to the customer, or by handing a bank forged or fraudulently obtained documents. Asking someone to do it, knowing they will use those methods, is also a violation. Under 15 U.S.C. 6823, a knowing violation carries up to five years in prison, so the client who hires it out is exposed too.
The exception lets a state-licensed investigator obtain financial information to collect child support from a person a court has found delinquent, and only when a court order authorizes it. Otherwise, records come through litigation: in a divorce or lawsuit, an attorney can seek bank records by subpoena or in discovery. An investigator can still point to likely banking relationships through public records such as court judgments and property filings, but knowing where an account may exist is not the same as seeing what is in it.
Anyone promising a stranger’s balances or statements for a fee is describing pretexting. Phone records follow the same pattern, explained in can a private investigator get phone records, and what a licensed investigator may lawfully do is covered in how to become a private investigator in Florida.