Online banking with bill pay

Today is Friday, so I can vent.

I really dislike the way some banks to business. I have seen it with clients that use debit cards and do not watch all of their transactions. I had a client who went to Starbucks and used her debit card to purchase some specialty coffee. With that purchase, she bounced her checking account. She uses that debit card maybe 5-10 times per day for everything. Well, bounce, bounce, bounce. Each small purchase received a $39.00 NSF fee. Wow! It turns out she should have had the money available and it was not because of an error where her car payment came out twice (for over $500), this made her balance low and all of her troubles began. We eventually had to go to the bank and sort this whole mess out and it took two months before the duplicate entry was reversed. They also did remove all the NSF fees. My biggest pet peeve is "why did they let her keep debiting if the money was not there?" Well, apparently it was to collect all of the NSF fees.

We have an interesting case of a young man who is suing Citizen's Bank here in Rhode Island for the same type of problem. He did not have the bank error, but felt that the bank did not let him know they were extending him credit in the form of covering debit card purchases when his account dropped below the amount he was charging. And if in fact this is a "loan", then a charge at the local coffee shop of $3.00 makes the interest and fine of $39.00 illegal. I cannot wait to see the outcome of this lawsuit.

Lynda

Check out my website www.artesanibookkeeping.com