Ridiculous amounts of OD fees.

This is just an FYI for you.

Even though you may not like the fees at BOA, you may not be able to
open an account at another bank.

Based on what you've stated here on Planetfeedback, when you go to
another bank to open an account the Personal Banker will pull a
credit/financial report on you. At that time you may be denied
opening an account due to the several overdrafts that you recently
had. Any bank that you go to will know in advance of opening an
account for you that you've had overdrafts at another banking
institution.

Just make sure that if you plan on opening an account at another bank
you keep the BOA account open, or you won't have access to any
account.

On another note - I don't think BOA will refund any of your fees.

Overdraft fees are required by federal law to be charged by banks. A
share of the OD fees must be paid to the federal government in order
for the bank to be insured by FDIC. Even when a bank forgives
overdraft fees, they still have to pay the government their percentage
of the fee so the bank is actually eating the costs of you're mistakes
when you ovedraw.

I also find it interesting how easily the government will let you
believe that bankers charge you these fees because they are greedy and
want to rip you off to get their hands on you're money, when the
government actually has their hand in the banker's pockets.

In addition to the excellent points others made below me, I also want
to say that a bank may be willing to do a one-time courtesy refund of
an overdraft charge. However, if you go overdrawn on your bank account
several times in a matter of months, they will be a lot less willing
to refund those fees.

1) Your balance - including pending transactions - is available
online

2) Money put into your account may also be a pending transaction - you
should be able to see it online.

in fact banks routinely say that money deposited may not be available
immediately for use.

3) They are not required to refund you the overdraft fee as far as i
know. And, from what i've been told... chase might not let you see
your "pending transactions" list ... i don't know for sure though.



Basically it's best to not try using a check or deposit until you know
for certain it has cleared - meaning it's not on the "pending
transaction" list.

And since you said you did this at night, it will not be available
until the next business day.


Actually, a cash deposit at night at the ATM.... I've never done that
but... the amount you put in has to be verified to be exact and
authentic currency yes? And ... do they do that at night when no one
is there?

Think about it. When you made a cash deposit to the ATM that night,
there was nobody there to look in the envelope and verify that you
actually put cash in the envelope. If someone you only barely know
told you that they had put some cash under your door, would you take
their word for it and let them use money in your wallet to pay bills?
Of course not! You would wait until you had a chance to go make sure
that they actually really had left the cash. Banks are the same way.
Just as you wouldn't make your money available to someone who merely
told you they had left you cash someone else, the bank was *not* going
to make the money available to you just on your word that you had left
some cash in a deposit envelope, no matter what any other source told
you (and you are clearly relying on the wrong source). The money
wasn't available until it had posted to the account, and there is no
way it was going to be posted to your account until after someone had
gone to the ATM, retrieved the various deposit envelopes, and
confirmed that yours had the amount of money in it that you said it
did.

You need to get a check register and go through your agreement with
BoA to find out when you can expect various kinds of funds -- cash
left at an ATM, a check given to a teller, an electronic transfer,
etc. -- to clear. Add on some time to be safe and because if a
deposit and a payment post on the same day the payment will be
processed first. Then keep track of what you are putting in and
taking out, and always make sure to give each deposit or transfer the
right amount of time before relying on it.

The only way to stop paying overdraft fees is to stop overdrawing your
accounts; and the only way to stop overdrawing your accounts is to
figure out exactly how your accounts actually work and then make sure
money is actually available to you before you spend it.

i think its almost cheaper to go to a payday loan center.

example
$150 dollar loan plus $30 fee= $180 to cover transactions till payday

BOA example. five transactions $30 dollars each.
$150 five OD fees at $34 each: $170

Payday loan= $180
BOA overdraft= $320

those places get and deserve a bad rap, but the total cost is almost
50% cheaper.

Think about it

Ok. Banks usae stratagy to get as much overdraft money from you as
possible..let me start off by saying if you use a check register and
don't spend money you don't have there will be no reason for
overdraft. On the other hand for example; jack has $50 in his account.
He buys cigs for $5, mcdonalds for $10 coffee for $2 then goes to
walmart and spends $43 and turns in his $1 redbox movie all in the
same day. Total spending $61. Here is where I think banks rob you. At
night (usually midnight) these items will post to jacks
account...insted of posting the $1, $2, $5, $10 First. They will post
the biggest one first (banks say its because they want to make sure
your largest,most important payments are paid) but believe me
everything will get "paid" at a price. They would post the $43 FIRST,
Then post the $10 and charge a $35 fee leaving you with negative $38
then post the $5 cigs leaving jack with -$78 then post $2 coffee
balance -$115 then post redbox $1 leaving -$156. All because of $11
jack spect too much! If they would have posted his smaller items first
jack would have only been charged $35 for his fees. Which is still a
lot but not enough for jack to be as upset as daniel is. My point is
once you overdraft like that it is really hard to get "caught up".
Overdrafts are expensive but check registers are Free!!

There's your problem right there! It makes no matter whether your O/D
is 20 cents or $20K, every time you spend more than what is physically
in your account (NOT pending, but actually AVAILABLE) you risk getting
smacked with an avalanche of fees.

And every ATM I have ever seen has a large, prominent sign that says
"Funds from deposits may not be available immediately." You put money
into the account through an ATM, AT NIGHT! Would it have killed you to
wait a day or two to pay the bill? (Just so you know, most ATM's put
longer than normal holds on deposited funds to avoid fraud or "kiting"
schemes)

I'm sorry, but while it may seem excessive, perhaps instead of
threatening to leave if they don't refund these fees, you should take
it as a very expensive lesson and start paying closer attention to
your balance. Otherwise, there will just be a letter to Chase here on
PFB 6 months from now!

Chase will "reward" with you the same fees!


Good Day

And you will have the same issues with Chase. Every ATM I've used
explains when deposited funds will be available.

If you racked up almost $500 worth of fees, you are not managing your
account properly. I suggest getting a paper check register and not
spending any money until you are sure the deposit has cleared. That
will help you avoid overdraft fees in the future.

This is not unique to BoA. Switch to Chase, and within a month or two
the same thing will happen.

All you have to do is Google "Chase Bank Overdraft" to see the proof.

The problem is, you don't understand how to use your checking account
in a manner that prevents overdrafts. This explains why it has
happened to you "several times over the past few months."

Incurring overdrafts is an expensive hobby. It doesn't matter if you
overdraft a little or a lot.

Maybe you should switch to cash. There are no fees associated with
cash. Either you have enough or you don't. You'll have more if you
aren't giving it to your checking account bank.