Bank of Thieves?

Tillmorn

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Normally I don't like to discuss financial matters, but I'd like to get everyone's opinion on something.

My checking account at Bank of America was overdrawn by $69 on the 22nd. The problem is that sometime during the day about 12 purchases showed up for the 21st that had already been cleared before the weekend. A prime example: A purchase of roughly $32 from etix, that happened midday on the 17th was processed and cleared the same day (my account had the money taken out of it), showed back up on my statement for the 21st (with money being taken out of the account again)...with no record of the original purchase date. There is literally a gap between the 17th and the 21st with no purchases whatsoever showing. Now then, I realize that most of the time, purchases made over the weekend show up as being "cleared" by the next bank business day. But a five day gap? And even if something does not clear the same day, it is always shown as processing on my online statement (with those funds already being removed from my available balance), and the amount of money that shows up as being available always matches up with the mental tally I keep.

I'm not one to believe in conspiracy theories, or make them up. But I believe Bank of America charged me twice for some of my purchases. Literally, yesterday morning I was sitting at $207 available, waiting for my electricity bill of $187 to be withdrawn. I made one purchase of $8.30ish. By 7pm, I received an email saying I was $69 overdrawn....for "cleared" charges that all "went through" on the 21st (plus my electricity bill for the 22nd)...yet 10 hours earlier were not on my online statement, and nothing was processing when I checked that morning. Seems odd to me that suddenly a whole slew of charges showed up for the 21st, on the evening of the 22nd, that were not there that morning. Some of the charges included purchases made mid last week, that were all cleared last week, yet are now missing those statements and are instead showing up for the 21st.

Now then, I've managed to talk Bank of America into forgiving the Overdraft fees of $70 and allow me to only pay the $69 that was overdrawn. Their excuse: The merchants are to blame. Yet those merchants, who I've purchased from before (some on a weekly basis)...don't take between 5 and 8 days to clear transactions with my account. With the exception of one gas station I use, when I make a purchase, it is deducted from my account or at least shown as "processing" and my available balance reflects that "processing" purchase.

Also, side note: $31 was pulled from my savings account to help cover my overdraft, yet it does not show up anywhere on my checking account statement. I seem to be...missing that money.

Thoughts? Because I'm out of them.
 

dezymond

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file a complaint. Happened with me once with Wells Fargo, I don't completely blame it on them as I canceled an online order and the other company still charged me. I have 2 or 3 friends with BOA and they have always had problems with them, which is why I never went with them. I don't know why they're still with them to be honest.
 

Natey2

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Pay with a credit card. They generally offer a little more dispute-resolution in your favor, compared to paying directly from a bank account or a debit card.

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jimmyco2008

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I still wonder who deposited $100 into my BOA account...then withdrew it a little later. :l
 

thesoldier

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I have had two bad experiences with BoA already, twice there were charges of a few hundred dollars to random online retailers that I've never done business with. Both times I was able to prove they were false charges and get my money back though, so I'm happy about that.

Although I'm completely stumped on how there is such a huge gap on your statement...doesn't make any sense.

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Mike.757

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Join a federal credit union. They will take great care off you.

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Natey2

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BOA will take good care of you if you are a Prima customer ($25K minimum deposit, I think). I've seen them reverse bank fees even when it was clearly the customer's fault. Financial institutions will go greater distances to retain their non-average customers.

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Natey2

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I've had fradulent charges on my credit cards (non-BOA) in the past. I don't hold the card issuer or its bank responsible, and they have been helpful in resolving those charges.
Out-of-State crooks somehow got my card number (and others') and managed to use it.

A proper punishment for credit card crooks would be a life sentence of cutting up *tons* of expired credit cards with a lousy pair of scissors. Lol.

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LegalAmerican

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I work for a federal credit union, and although I wouldn't put it past a bank to screw you, I can honestly say that 99.9% of the time when someone comes in and asks me why their balance is "wrong" I can show them within 5 minutes and they ALWAYS forgot about something, or they don't understand that pending electronic charges cannot always be predicted. My advice? Always keep a paper trail or balance register and don't try to outsmart the computer. I just don't imagine a large company like boa intentionally trying to jack up your acct. That being said, call and have them go through it with you, that's what they are paid to do.

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BroidDrionic

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For-profit banks are pretty clear about how they get money from you when you sign up for an account, and it's via overdraft fees.
Banks openly discuss adjusting transaction times in order to charge the largest transaction first, so that if you had several small charges afterward you get charged an overdraft fee multiple times instead of just once.
Banks were making so much money from overdraft fees that it's now illegal for them to automatically sign you up for overdraft protection.
My suggestion is to look into a not-for-profit bank, like any credit union in existence.

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Natey2

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I don't recall ever paying an overdraft fee in over 2 decades, so they must be making money somewhere else :) I look for many fee-free ATM machine locations, and BOA has the most, and by a very large margin too.

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Mike.757

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I use Navy Federal Credit Union. They have a sharing agreement with all of the other credit unions around here as well as 99% of all 7-11s. I can find a "free" ATM just about anywhere. One thing I like about NFCU, when they post all of the transactions for the day, they post deposits first then they deduct payments. It really helps if you are on the fine line with regard to you account balance. Also, with most CUs, you can have the bare minimum (for NFCU, $5 in savings) and not pay any service fees. Also if you do make an occasional mistake and bounce a check and call them about it they will reverse the charge (one every couple of years, not every other month).
 

vatothe0

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Yep. I got ripped off by Chase when they messed up a rewards program I was paying for. Since it was just cash back, I never thought to check on it and make sure it was working. Two years and $50 in fees later, they have no idea why I didn't get my cash back but won't do anything about it.

After a month of callbacks that never happened, I opened an account at BECU, moved my automatic deposit and started the transition. Closed out the Chase account in person and the guy promised to look into it and call me within 2 weeks. It's been 4 months.

Even tried PlanetFeedback and got nowhere.

Credit union is so much better anyway.

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