I HAVE 4 WORDS FOR THEM
‘Bank of the West’. Been with them since 1995 with a Checking/Savings Account and several other years before my current association with them. and a few years ago I was honered with one of their MASTERCARDs
Have you ever tried to get a roll of quarters from the bank for laundery or poker. Every bank I have done this at refused because I wasn’t a customer. Bank of the West asked after giving them to me to see if I was interested it opening and account not as a qualification to get the quarters.
I had more money in my account than I should have one time and they informed me it was the interest I was earning on my checking account.

ALL in ALL GREAT BANK

You know what my parents would do when they got a fee for bouncing a check?

They fucking paid it, didn’t they?

I’ve had two overdraft fees in my entire life. Once because of a merchant double-posting a charge to my account (which was fixed), and once when I forgot a 28.00 check clearing my account.

The first one was refunded, the second one I paid.

Why have we come to a point where we are okay with spending money before we have it? It shouldn’t matter what order items clear; its a matter of personal respnsibility.

Banks are businesses. They are out for a profit. But they are not scammers, nor are they evil. You just have to pay some fucking attention is all.

Three things will solve all your fee problems. 1. Write down what you spend, or use financial software and check it every morning. 2. Never, ever float checks or automatic payments. 3. Get overdraft protection – even if its just a savings account with 20 bucks in it.

Otherwise, shut up and pay the fees.

If I were in a position where I didn’t have enough money to pay fees, I’d track every penny I spent. I don’t need the bank to hold my goddamn hand, nor would I hold them responsible for my negligence.

Firstly, we do not, in fact, balance our accounts. We do spend more money than we have, and in a lot of situations we are unaware of our bank’s deposit posting procedure. Federal law states that if the check is provided by the federal treasury, you may wait no longer than one business day from the business day your deposit is made for those funds to be available. Employment checks, personal checks, money orders, and even Certified (aka cashiers checks) may have delayed availibility for a time period specified by the disclosure given to us when the account is opened. If in doubt, ask a teller or banker. Usually if a bank representative gives you incorrect information, the bank will accommodate you. What it boils down to: know when your money will be able to be spent. Track your balance. Understand your bank’s deposit schedule.

Secondly, transactions are ordered from largest to smallest. Fair? Unfair? We all agreed to it by opening our respectivee accounts. Banks will always maximize profit. Consumers will always view an ideal situation. New regulations provide each domestic bank to allow the consumer a choice in whether a debit card purchase will be paid (usually with a fee). These regulations do not apply to automatic payments or checks, as writing checks without a sufficient balance is illegal, and automatic payments are a contract set forth by the consumer to a third party. The bank may not dictate how you obligate your money, so these must be paid. Bottom line: the bank is a hypothetical mattress under which you keep your money. You may spend more than you have, in some instances, but the financial institution may, and will, only pay things the consumer has already promised to pay.

Thirdly, we view fees as if someone sinister has the job of meticulously viewing every account’s activity, then assessing the fee, one at a time. Unless a particular bank is unique, each bank has an automated system that must adhere to the contract to which we agreed. The person with whom you talk about your fees at the bank had nothing to do with the fee itself. Their goal should be educating you about why the fee happened, and how to prevent it in the future. (Side note: this is their job. They should be pleasant, courteous, and respectful. Most bankers converse with clients about this situation on a regular basis. You should not expect to be treated unfairly, with scorn, or feeling as though you were singled out. You must return this respect. The person in front of you will only be as courteous as you are. Meat and potatoes: a bank may only charge us what we said was ok, even if it angers us.

Finally, ‘pending’ transactions.

Part 1: The majority of banks will provide a ‘balance’ and an ‘available balance.’ This is where it gets confusing. The available balance is money we have access to at this moment. The balance is the actual total of how much money you have in your account. This will include purchases that aren’t ‘settled’ by the individual places where the purchases are made. You may authorize a payment to a department store, and they may not take the money for several days. This transaction will show as ‘pending’. The bank earmarked those funds to be paid to that particular place, but typically only earmark that money for 72 hours. After that time frame, the bank typically cannot hold those funds any longer and ‘forgets’ the transaction entirely. However, that money is still spent, and will be paid, when the place of business decides to finalize the transaction. If you use your PIN to make a purchase, usually the money instantly is transferred out of your account. There are exceptions. If you ‘pay at the pump’, typically a gas station will hold a given amount ($1.00 is common). They will then ‘settle’ that payment days later, charging the full amount. Typically, this is because this is a NON-PIN purchase. The dollar amount held at first lets the gas station know your account is open, and in good standing, but since you haven’t filled your tank yet, the gas station doesn’t know how much you will spend until after your tank is full. (Same for restaurant tips. Usually they authorize the actual bill first, then take the full amount after tip).

Part 2: deposits. You may deposit a check and expect it to be available immediately. Federal law says that you will be given $100.00 the day of a deposit if the check is more than $100.00. (if you make several deposits in one day, only $100.00 total will be made available). Your ‘balance’ will show the deposit, but the ‘available balance’ shows what you can spend. The ‘balance’ will also show pending payments to places where a transaction took place. A good rule of thumb is to add your deposited check (minus $100.00 because that $100.00 should already be added to your available balance ) to your available balance. Then you must know when that check will be ‘available for you to spend, which is between 1-5 business days, typically. Bullet point : go by your available balance any given day, but make sure that you know how much that ‘$1.00′ gas purchase was, and subtract that from your available balance, as well.

Notes: cash deposits must be made available no longer than one business day after the day of deposit, unless the deposit is made at an ATM. Most reputable banks and credit unions allow you to spend cash immediately, if the deposits is made in person (the ATM doesn’t know if you made a cash deposit).

Most reputable financial institutions allow directly deposited funds (I.e. direct deposit from an employer) to be spent immediately after the money is received.

Personal note: I’ve spent a lot of money on overdraft fees in my time. I realized that when I kept my money somewhere, I was agreeing to what that financial institution offered me. I learned, I adapted, and I made sure I was with a company that I could agree with. Bless you all.

Steve.

In fact, I just found out about the bank in question in this post settling a class action lawsuit on this exact issue…it cost them $9.5 million. Maybe someone in a position to do something read this post, it’s been quite popular.

Wife and I are both accountants, and understand the banking process completely, so we don’t incur fees and all the other crap because we micro manage the accounts.

BUT, we spoke to our branch manager about their crap, and ONLY after 15 minutes of the manager talking in circles, I advised her that we didn’t buy her explanation, and told her that I knew more about banking that she did.

They blame everyone but themselves (just the society we live in I guess) for their poor excuse for web banking.

The problem is that web banking needs to be real-time. It’s the merchants who really screw things up. The bank can only process what they’re given, but with transactions disappearing, etc., God only knows what they’re doing.

Bottom line, is that you have to keep track of everything and beat them at their own game.

They’re banking conditions say that on each day, they post deposits first, and THEN checks/transactions. I had a deposit hit on one day, then some transactions, and they frigged up and charged me nsf fees. Again went to the branch and listened to their explanation, and THEN cited their rules/regs back to them.

Manager sat there dumbfounded. She still didn’t want to reverse the transactions, so we advised her that we’d ask a judge to order them to do it, citing “breach of contract”.

It’s amazing how quickly things get done once you lay that card out on the table.