Is this a standard fee (punishment) for banks?

[ctfudge&bankofC-ville]

I had a checking account with a local bank and sort of forgot about it - I don't need it anymore and have been planning to close it because it seems silly to leave less than a dollar in there.

I was just cleaning and found an NSF notice, which shocked me. I thought it was just a statement and was just going to throw it away.

The hub made an honest mistake - in making a payment for one of his new accounts on Dec. 28th, he put the payment through and it tried to draw it from this old, disused checking account (the information was there, in the Checkfree account.)

I didn't know this till today. (Good thing he was a payment ahead on his Dell account, so there's no harm done there.) It says it was presented Dec. 31 and returned unpaid.

So they've charged me $34 (this is pretty standard, I know from mistakes in my "real" checking account) but it says that if the amount in my account remains negative after seven days from the date on the letter (date on letter is Dec. 31 but postmark on envelope is Jan 3), that $5 will be assessed on that day and every day thereafter that the account remains negative.

That part in bold is the part I am questioning. I've never heard of this, but I've never had an account go negative or rather, stay negative for very long before. Anyone know if this is standard bank nastiness? What if you didn't know about it for a year? They didn't try to contact me by e-mail or call me.

[DHK]

This is an incentive for people with overdrawn accounts to "hurry up" and make the account positive again.

At WF, they would do the $5/day for 5 days and stop. I don't know about other institutions.

I would "assume" that you would continue to receive statements in the mail that would show your month-end balance (growing consistently negative).

Banks just don't have time for email/calls anymore. They don't care and it's in THEIR best interests to let you forget about this account until you decide to pay up.

[ctfudge&bankofC-ville]

I guess I would keep getting the month-end statements, but since this happened on 12/31, it would be a whole month of fees before another notice would come up.

The notice did not say anything about stopping after any number of days. I guess I'm going in to settle up with them tomorrow. It's an honest mistake my husband made. I've done the same and have talked myself out of many NSF fees (with my bank, they just go ahead and pay it, though, but that's because I have an active balance, I guess.)

[Magdalen77]

I had a checking account with a local bank and sort of forgot about it - I don't need it anymore and have been planning to close it because it seems silly to leave less than a dollar in there.

I was just cleaning and found an NSF notice, which shocked me. I thought it was just a statement and was just going to throw it away.

The hub made an honest mistake - in making a payment for one of his new accounts on Dec. 28th, he put the payment through and it tried to draw it from this old, disused checking account (the information was there, in the Checkfree account.)

I didn't know this till today. (Good thing he was a payment ahead on his Dell account, so there's no harm done there.) It says it was presented Dec. 31 and returned unpaid.

So they've charged me $34 (this is pretty standard, I know from mistakes in my "real" checking account) but it says that if the amount in my account remains negative after seven days from the date on the letter (date on letter is Dec. 31 but postmark on envelope is Jan 3), that $5 will be assessed on that day and every day thereafter that the account remains negative.

That part in bold is the part I am questioning. I've never heard of this, but I've never had an account go negative or rather, stay negative for very long before. Anyone know if this is standard bank nastiness? What if you didn't know about it for a year? They didn't try to contact me by e-mail or call me.

I've never heard of that before. I've had a check bounce and the balance stay negative until my next direct deposit. Though, it's probably been 4 or 5 years since I was in such bad financial straits that that happened. But, wow, you're screwed and have no money and they make it worse by charging $5/day. By that right I could end up with $70-100 bounce fee.

[isislc]

I know UsBank counts the 7-10 days as business days and they continue adding up the fees for months on end. I had a fraudulent transaction happen on my account and never received any notices for 2 weeks until I did my bills for my next pay period. Tried using my checkcard and the account was empty. I called and found out all my money was pulled to pay for the fraudulent transaction and because I let it go for 2 weeks they refused to reverse the charge and let my other checks bounced that I told them I sent out already. So what would have been a $150 problem ballooned to a $1300 fault on their part in bounced check fees and $5 a day fines which they want me to pay and I refuse to do so. They can rot in He** before I touch that account.

[ctfudge&bankofC-ville]

Your horrible story about the 1,300 has taught me a valuable lesson.

Watch every account carefully, even if I think there's just 19 cents in it. Funny, too, how I had the urge all through December to go close that out before the end of the year. Problem would have been avoided.

And silly me, I felt kind of bad about thinking of closing it, since those smiling people at the bank had been so nice to me and hadn't done a thing wrong.

HA!!!!!!!!!

[ctfudge&bankofC-ville]

Well, gawd, after reading that last post in the "bouncing checks is a crime" thread, maybe the problem would NOT have been avoided.

Second lesson learned:

Be absolutely sure your account paying links are up-to-date. Being especially sure to DELETE information linked to accounts you don't want money drawn from by mistake.

[CleverCynic]

It's the latest rage... Suntrust just adopted it and dit it to me this summer... negative for a week they hit me with another NSF same amount. I had already deposited enough to cover the check, so the only negative part was thier charge, so they weren't losing or letting me borrow anything... that's what really pissed me off. If it was any other "bill" or fine I'd have a good 30 days to pay it.. instead they pretend you're stealing thier money by being negative.

[fred333]

That is a messed up sitiuation. I hate when banks mees with my money.

[ctfudge&bankofC-ville]

Later that day I got the actual statement which showed that they charged TWO non-sufficient funds fees, and with all the $5-per-day (which was capped at 10 days), somehow the fees rose to $118.

Well, you could knock me over with a feather right now. THey just called and told me they refunded ALL OF THE FEES.

I have never had a bank be THIS nice... I mean, I've talked my way out of a $38 fee now and then, with banks and with credit cards, but usually when it's a multiple fee like that, they'll refund just part of it.

They just earned my business back. I will be very careful with my balances now, but I can't just close my account after they were so nice. I guess they're competitive, and they won me back!