Banks & Overdraft Protection

[fused]

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bicknar wrote:

OK, 2 sides of my opinion on this.

Right.  Charge me for overdrawing.  I understand that for the bank services provided they get to use my money to make interest on investments.  When I overdraw I'm breaking that business contract.

Wrong.  Manipulating the books to maximize income on chargest.  e.g  I have $100. in my account.  I have one check out for $100  and 5 checks out for $10 each.  They all post on the same day.  Don't arrange them so that the 100 goes first and you hit me with 5 late fees.  That's just cruel.  But wait, I had a deposit that went in the next day for another $100.  And my next checks start to bounce because i'm still negative after the 5 $39.00 overdraft fees.

There is a line between doing business and making money. 

A

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+1!!!!!!!! I agree 100%. Banks should be required to debit accounts as the charges are received.

[MidnightVoice]

The banks in England got sued for charging too much for this, and lost, and had to pay it back 

It was salled usury

[Anonymous]

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@MidnightVoice wrote:

The banks in England got sued for charging too much for this, and lost, and had to pay it back 

It was salled usury

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I read somethng about that.  Pretty funny!  I think the banks there are still peeing blood over having to pay.

[MidnightVoice]

Back to the original point - I use USB, and last year I got one of their CCs as it has overfraft protection on it, just in case.

[Anonymous]

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@MidnightVoice wrote:
Back to the original point - I use USB, and last year I got one of their CCs as it has overfraft protection on it, just in case.

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I think it's always a good idea to have OD protection in some form.  I like PenFed and Navy Federal's OD line of credit products, but even using a CC as OD protection is a wise move ... better 1 or 2 days interest as a cash advance than getting hit with OD fees or bounced check fees.

[Anonymous]

I work for a bank and I have to say that I agree with the fees. The fact of the matter is you can go run your debit card as credit and clean your account out completely and it would take several days for the charges to actually hit your account depeding on how it's coded by the merchant.  In the mean time you could write checks or come in and withdraw the cash, all before the transactions you already did clear the account.  If the bank did not provide you with over draft protection then you would pay a fee to the bank and a fee to the merchant.  With overdraft protection you only pay the fee to the bank.  I small price to pay for being irresponsible.  It is not the banks job or their place tokeep track of your spending.

I haven't paid a NSF fee in YEARS.  Not becuase of some employee perk.  I would be fired for overdrafting my account.  But because I am extremely responsible with my monery.  You see you get this really nifty little thing called a check register and you track your spending.  Personally, I keep all of my reciepts and use an excel spreadsheet that I created each night to balance my check book before I go to bed.  Then you use online banking to make sure that there isn't anything coming through that you forgot about.  Also ALWAYS keep emergency cash in a savings account so that you can transfer it over if you see that you over spent.  If you prefer not to be quite so obsessive about your spending then you could do what my husband does.  He puts it all on one credit card that he keeps for daily expenses.  Then he transfers his entire allowance to his card each pay period.

My husband and I also have seperarate checking accounts, plus a third account that our direct deposit goes in to and we use to pay the set bills, ie mortgage, our allowances, car insurance, credit card payments, the stuff that doesn't fluctuate.  In case of emergency, I'm joint of his, he's joint on mine.   Other than an emergency though, I use my account and he uses his.  We both get an allowance that is a set amount that come out the budget.

Learning responsible money management did not happen over night, but eventually we both realized that we didn't want to donate anything more to the bank and the only way to stop was to start tracking our money.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I work for a bank and I have to say that I agree with the fees. The fact of the matter is you can go run your debit card as credit and clean your account out completely and it would take several days for the charges to actually hit your account depeding on how it's coded by the merchant.  In the mean time you could write checks or come in and withdraw the cash, all before the transactions you already did clear the account.  If the bank did not provide you with over draft protection then you would pay a fee to the bank and a fee to the merchant.  With overdraft protection you only pay the fee to the bank.  I small price to pay for being irresponsible.  It is not the banks job or their place tokeep track of your spending.

I haven't paid a NSF fee in YEARS.  Not becuase of some employee perk.  I would be fired for overdrafting my account.  But because I am extremely responsible with my monery.  You see you get this really nifty little thing called a check register and you track your spending.  Personally, I keep all of my reciepts and use an excel spreadsheet that I created each night to balance my check book before I go to bed.  Then you use online banking to make sure that there isn't anything coming through that you forgot about.  Also ALWAYS keep emergency cash in a savings account so that you can transfer it over if you see that you over spent.  If you prefer not to be quite so obsessive about your spending then you could do what my husband does.  He puts it all on one credit card that he keeps for daily expenses.  Then he transfers his entire allowance to his card each pay period.

My husband and I also have seperarate checking accounts, plus a third account that our direct deposit goes in to and we use to pay the set bills, ie mortgage, our allowances, car insurance, credit card payments, the stuff that doesn't fluctuate.  In case of emergency, I'm joint of his, he's joint on mine.   Other than an emergency though, I use my account and he uses his.  We both get an allowance that is a set amount that come out the budget.

Learning responsible money management did not happen over night, but eventually we both realized that we didn't want to donate anything more to the bank and the only way to stop was to start tracking our money.

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Although I agree in part -- especially about the check register -- but the fact is that with a debit card purchase the merchant obtains an authorization upon swiping the card.  That authorization shows up immediately in the bank and the bank automatically freezes that portion of your available funds.  You simply are not able then to withdraw that money from your account.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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Although I agree in part -- especially about the check register -- but the fact is that with a debit card purchase the merchant obtains an authorization upon swiping the card.  That authorization shows up immediately in the bank and the bank automatically freezes that portion of your available funds.  You simply are not able then to withdraw that money from your account.

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That's not always the case.  Again, it depends on how it is coded by the merchant.  Sometimes it is an imediate thing, but I've had transactions that have taken days to even show as pending on my account.  This is especially true of online pruchases.I think as technology advances it will become more instantaneous, but we're just not there yet. 

But the fact of the matter remains, the only person responsible for tracking your spending and keeping up with your finances is you.  I see it every day.  People come in and knowingly place there account in a negative status and then come in screaming cause they want to know why they have fees and what happened to all their money.  Some of them are young and dumb and just learning cause they're new, but you'd be surprised how many older adults who ought to know better can't seem to keep up with there money.  It's insane.

[haulingthescoreup]

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sllbaker wrote:

I haven't paid a NSF fee in YEARS.  Not becuase of some employee perk.  I would be fired for overdrafting my account... 

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Now that's one way of getting people to smarten up!

And +1,000,000 on the check register. Just brought mine current last night before I turned out the bedside lamp. It's either every morning or every evening, and sometimes it's both.

I'm glad I have my OD protection, and I'm glad that I've barely ever used it. And paid it back the next day when I realized what had happened.

[Anonymous]

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@haulingthescoreup wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

I haven't paid a NSF fee in YEARS.  Not becuase of some employee perk.  I would be fired for overdrafting my account... 

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Now that's one way of getting people to smarten up! =

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I know, right!  Seriously, in my interview to become a teller that was the first thing they told me.  The logic is that if I can't be responsible with my own money, how can I be trusted with anyone elses.  They also did a full background check that would make the feds proud, verified my work history and all my references and pulled all 3 of my credit reports.  I almost didn't get the job because my husbands score is questionable.   They decided that his income negated his score, but warned me to be extremely careful about giving him access to my account because I would be accountable no matter what.