14 August 2009
Bank of America – Love and Hate
Lately it’s been more like tolerate and hate, which is I’m writing this post. I know that I just told you that I’m planning to break up with my credit card provider, but I’m heading towards another breakup. This breakup involves both my personal and business checking accounts. I can’t put all of the blame on BOA, because I didn’t honor the terms of my agreement, but the agreement sucks. Let’s just put it that way.
Last month, our family decided to go all cash and stop using the credit card for any purchases. In theory, this would work out fine, but in practice, we were used to living a month ahead of our payments. Essentially we didn’t have to pay for most of our expenses until up to 30 days later. Now we were forced with making up for last month as well as paying cash for the coming month. Needless to say, this left us a little tight on the cash in our account. After a couple of months, it should resolve itself since we will be caught up and there should be a comfortable balance in the account. Anyway, that’s the background and here is the story:
08/03/2009 – Account Balance: $850.50
Make a cash withdrawal of $450 to cover some of month’s expenses. Forget to make an entry in my budgeting software. A check for $250 clears as well as several other purchases made on this date.
New Account Balance: $51.30.
08/04/2009 – Innocent and unaware of the account balance, I purchase groceries ($55.76) a couple of things at home depot ($18.95) and pickup dinner ($7.55).
New Account Balance: $-30.96
That makes BOA angry and you don’t want to see BOA when they’re angry.
08/05/2009 – I was unaware, but for each of my purchases above that caused an overdraft to my account, I earned a nice little $35 overdraft charge. ($105 total).
08/06/2009 – Remember that I was unaware of the overdraft fees above. Knowing that I was getting low on cash, I set up a transfer of cash from another account, but I knew it would take a day or two to post. Still having forgotten to enter the $450 withdrawal in my software, I assumed that I still had a bit of cash left, so I went shopping: breakfast ($3.23), lunch ($6.45) and miscellaneous ($11.23). Later that day, I decide that maybe I should check my account online. “What?!?!?” I exclaim in my head. I immediately call Bank of America and explain the situation and let them know that I am making a deposit that should more than cover all of my expenses and request mercy. I am placed on hold, but when they come back, they say that as a one-time, first-time courtesy, they can remove the fees. $105 saved. I love you Bank of America! I’ll never do it again, I promise.
08/07/2009 – Transfer completes. Paycheck deposited. Account balance should be in the thousands now. I go online to verify that my fees were removed. They were…but what’s this? Remember those three new purchases yesterday? There are now overdraft fees for these in the amount of $105… again. Again, I call BOA and this time they’re not quite as receptive. I’m flatly told that these charges are correct and that there is nothing that they can do. I question them further, asking that if they had not removed my first charges, then I seriously would have been charged $210 in fees for around $50 in charges when they don’t even notify me that I have overdrafted. The answer of course was yes. I promptly let them know that this is insane and end the conversation. I guess I’ll live with the results of my actions and move on.
It’s nice of BOA to offer this service, which keeps me from being embarrassed at McDonalds when my card is declined. I get my meal, no one knows that I’m broke and later I only have to pay $40 for that burger.
I could go on, but this post is growing too large. I’ll continue in the next post.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you like, or can at least stand to read what I write,
make sure you add my RSS Feed to your list so you don't miss a single post.
If you have no idea what I'm talking about, read this.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
2 Comments currently posted.
BofA amends checking overdraft fees « Life of an Investor says:
Life of an Investor » Bank of America Eliminating Debit Card Overdrafts - Investment Advice says:
[...] I previously blogged about a situation which I am not proud of in which I racked up some overdraft fees from Bank of America due to a lack of planning. Then a few months ago, I told you about the fact that BOA was limiting their fees to only $140 a day. Now I have the pleasure of announcing that Bank of America will be eliminating the ability to overdraft with a debit card at all. It’s a shocking new idea: If there is no money in the account, the transaction will be declined. I’d much prefer to be told that I can’t pay for my $5 lunch than to enjoy my $5 lunch to find out that I was actually paying $40 for the privilege. There is a new federal regulation that will require banks to gain permission to allow you to overdraft, but BOA took it another step and eliminated them altogether. I’m not quite sure what their motivation is on this one? That is cutting off a huge revenue stream for them. Maybe my angry calls to customer service got to them… [...]
[...] Bank of America is modifying some of it’s policies regarding overdraft fees. Well, I guess it’s a start, although it wouldn’t have helped much with my situation. [...]