What Wells Fargo was doing was allowing debit purchases to go through when a customer's account was overdrawn. But Bank of America has the same practice, and this blogger experienced it after a client bounced a check.
My sources in and out of Bank of America have confirmed this problem. In other words, Bank of America has practiced the same process Wells Fargo was accused of and is now ordered to pay its customers back to settle.
U.S. District Judge William Alsup accused Wells Fargo of profiteering
According to the AP, U.S. District Judge William Alsup, who's in the Northern District Court of California in San Francisco, accused Wells Fargo of profiteering, specifically "Internal bank memos and e-mails leave no doubt that, overdraft revenue being a big profit center, the bank's dominant, indeed sole, motive was to maximize the number of overdrafts."
In this blogger's experience with his Bank of America account, there were as many as not one, but three overdraft penalties drawn in one day, and four in two days, separated by the weekend, from two vendors!
What should happen is simple: one overdraft penalty for one charge unpaid. That's it. Bank of America should be the focus of California Attorney General Jerry Brown's gaze, and sooner rather than later.
Fennie,
ReplyDeletethe types of policies you mentioned are fairly standard. At least among larger banks. Until recently, Chase would allow you to overdraft 6 times in one day before stopping your purchase. Wells Fargo is the same way, I believe.
Bank of America is doing away with overdraft fees, isn't it? Can't you opt out of them now?
BULL-ONEY!!! DONT BELIEVE IT.. IT'S JUST PROPAGANDA..
ReplyDeleteWE'LL SEE IF THEY EVEN HONOR THE "UNDER TEN DOLLAR" AMENDMENT TO YOUR ACCOUNT AGREEMENT.
WHICH SPECIFIED THAT YOU MIGHT EVEN HAVE TO CONTACT THEM IF YOU RECIVED THE $35 PENALTY CHARGE (AND RE-CHARGE), AND THEN IT WOULD BE RETURNED TO YOU. ALL OF THIS TAKES TIME! AND EFFORT! IT WASN'T, AUTOMATIC. THE AGREEMENT STATES THAT THEY ARE WAVERING THE OVERDRAFT CHARGE, IF THE AMOUNT OF THE OVERDRAFT IS UNDER TEN DOLLARS. HOWEVER, I SENT IN TWO TRIAL DEPOSITS FROM ANOTHER BANK, WELLS FARGO, DAYS AHEAD OF THE DEFICIT IN THE CHECKING THAT I HAD ALREADY ANTICIPATED ..AND WAS TRYING TO GET AHEAD OF, BUT INSTEAD THE BALANCE WENT BELOW THE LINE FROM A CHECK PROCESSED IN SACRAMENTO'S DMV OFFICE THAT IMMEDIATELY PLACED A 35 DOLLAR OVERDRAFT CHARGE ONCE, TO RECEIVE, A THEN A MERE 25-cent & 15-cent PAIR OF TRIAL DEPOSITS AND THEN AGAIN TO RETURN!! ..THE 37 CENTS TOTAL TO THE BANK THAT SENT THE SMALL AMOUNT WHICH AT THE TIME WAS WELL ABOVE THE LINE AT THE TIME IT WAS RECEIVED. THEN, VERIFICATION OF ALL OF THIS PROCESS-TOOK ANOTHER TWO DAYS OR SO WHILE I HAD RECEIVED A LETTER FROM BANK OF AMERICA INDICATING THAT IF THE DEFICIT WASNT RESOLVED BY THE TENTH or ELENTH of the MONTH, I WOULD RECEIVE AN ADDITTIONAL OVERCHARGE LEVY FOR THE "EXTENDED OVERDRAFT" .. ALL IN ALL --BANK of AMERICA in my opinion, IS -A VERY HARD !! BANK. NOT JUST A STICKLER, WHEN IT COMES TO DETAIL. ITS PROBABLY ALL COMPUTERIZED AND PRE-PROGRAMMED TO MAKE A LOT OF MONEY FOR THEM THROUGH --TIMING-- THE SAME WAY. TOO SLOW!! OR TOO FAST. HOWEVER--SOME RETORIC OF THE AGGREEMENT APPEARS TO INDICATE THAT THEY WILL COMPENSATE REGARDING THE CHARGES AND MAY BE ABLE TO RETURN THEM TO YOU IF, --NOW GET THIS-- "YOU CAN PROVE THAT YOU MADE AN HONEST EFFORT TO RESOLVE THE DEFICIT IN TIME" -- THAT MEANS .. I HAVE TO USE THE TELEPHONE?? AGH!! HOW LONG WILL THAT TAKE .. I'LL BE ON HOLD, I'M SURE; AND ONLINE--WELL, ..NOT BAD AT ALL.
SUBMITTED FOR COSIDERATION: on 8-17-2010 2PM Pacific. NAME: Rick.