A good friend of mine owns a small store in West Hollywood, Calif., a mom and mom store.  She called me from her bank this morning, freaked out over the failure of the IndyMac Bancorp, seized by the FDIC on Friday after a bank run in which panicked customers withdrew more than $1.3 billion of deposits in 11 business days.

She literally walked into her bank, a Wells Fargo, to make sure everything was OK.  And only then realized she had over $100,000 in her personal account.

Amounts over $100,000 are not insured.

"The bank teller told me Wells Fargo wasn't in danger -- it was the smaller banks," she related to me.  "But it didn't instill me with confidence when she told me I couldn't just open another account for the overflow -- it's one $100,000 account per social security number, per bank."

Well, sorta.

The FDIC only insures and individual investor $100,000 in all nonretirement accounts per institution; $250,000 in a retirement account. There's higher insurance amounts for joint accounts or payable-on-death accounts, but they have to be carefully designated and labeled; not all bank employees seem clear on these rules.) If the bank fails, the insured money is safe.

As my friend noted, any amount above the insurance limits could be lost, or greatly diminished.  In the case of the unfortunate folks who banked at IndyMac, they're expected to get 50 cents on the dollar -- or less -- for amounts over the $100,000 in individual nonretirement accounts.

And how safe is her money at Wells Fargo?  Probably fine, but adding to my friend's anxiety, this morning John Bovenzi, chief operating officer of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, said in an interview that he expected to see more U.S. banks fail ... but not a large number.

Suppose you have more than $100,000 you'd like to put in a CD -- or millions. What must you do?  Run all over town opening up accounts in every bank you see to insure your money is insured?

There's a simpler answer many people don't know about. You could get FDIC insurance coverage for the full amount by using the Certificate of Deposit Account Registry Service, or CDARS. Although some 2,000 U.S. banks participate in CDARS it doesn't seem to get much press. And unfortunately for my friend, Wells Fargo doesn't offer it.

Here's how it works: without having to place your money yourself in lots of different banks, with CDARS you sign one agreement with a participating local bank or other financial institution of your choice, earn one interest rate, and receive one regular statement.

Your local bank divides the money among banks in the network, making sure no accounts exceed FDIC insurance limits. There is no fee, and all of the money is FDIC insured.  For a nationwide list of CDARS-participating banks, click to their Website.