This made me so mad, but not surprised. I think about this kind of thing as society goes more and more "cashless." The banks have more control all the time.
ConEd mis-metered my apartment the first month I moved in, charged me $4000, auto-withdrew it from my account where I had only $1800, low for me because, you know, I had just moved and paid two months rent, moving costs, and so forth, and the bank charged me an overdraft fee.
I got things sorted with ConEd. I got things sorted with the bank. I spent about a week filing a "Yes this happened ask ConEd here's the number no I am not committing fraud" paperwork with the bank. In the end my account was cleared back to its correct number and no harm no foul.
Except the overdraft fees the bank charged during the week it took to clear this issue up.
Damn, that's brutal. Getting stuck with the overdraft fees really adds insult to injury. That's the thing when you're dealing with these huge companies. Even if they screw up, you have such little recourse. And even if you do have recourse, it takes so much time and effort to rectify a situation. You may get the money back (sans the overdraft fees), but you don't get that time back.
I too learned this the hard way back in the day, not as tough a lesson as yours though! I'm always looking at things like this through the lens of living abroad, and most countries don't allow that kind of nonsense. In Colombia there is no such thing as overdraft, but we're talking about a country with some of the strictest banking laws there are, for obvious reasons. Plus, some huge percentage of the population is unbanked; they only use cash or instant transfer apps like Nequi, Daviplata, Transfiya, etc. U.S. banks are decadent and depraved, and keeping too many dirty members of congress too well funded to do anything about it...
I didn't know Colombia doesn't have overdraft, but it makes sense. Being unbanked is a whole other challenge, though. Thanks for the thoughtful comment, Miles.
It's crazy that banks aren't legally compelled to make these things clear from the get-go. Another reason why centralized entities should be minimized to whatever extent possible--more inefficiencies, more cost, and more crazy!
This made me so mad, but not surprised. I think about this kind of thing as society goes more and more "cashless." The banks have more control all the time.
It drives me crazy that taxpayers bailed out the banks in '08 only to be repaid with predatory practices.
ConEd mis-metered my apartment the first month I moved in, charged me $4000, auto-withdrew it from my account where I had only $1800, low for me because, you know, I had just moved and paid two months rent, moving costs, and so forth, and the bank charged me an overdraft fee.
I got things sorted with ConEd. I got things sorted with the bank. I spent about a week filing a "Yes this happened ask ConEd here's the number no I am not committing fraud" paperwork with the bank. In the end my account was cleared back to its correct number and no harm no foul.
Except the overdraft fees the bank charged during the week it took to clear this issue up.
Damn, that's brutal. Getting stuck with the overdraft fees really adds insult to injury. That's the thing when you're dealing with these huge companies. Even if they screw up, you have such little recourse. And even if you do have recourse, it takes so much time and effort to rectify a situation. You may get the money back (sans the overdraft fees), but you don't get that time back.
I too learned this the hard way back in the day, not as tough a lesson as yours though! I'm always looking at things like this through the lens of living abroad, and most countries don't allow that kind of nonsense. In Colombia there is no such thing as overdraft, but we're talking about a country with some of the strictest banking laws there are, for obvious reasons. Plus, some huge percentage of the population is unbanked; they only use cash or instant transfer apps like Nequi, Daviplata, Transfiya, etc. U.S. banks are decadent and depraved, and keeping too many dirty members of congress too well funded to do anything about it...
I didn't know Colombia doesn't have overdraft, but it makes sense. Being unbanked is a whole other challenge, though. Thanks for the thoughtful comment, Miles.
It's crazy that banks aren't legally compelled to make these things clear from the get-go. Another reason why centralized entities should be minimized to whatever extent possible--more inefficiencies, more cost, and more crazy!
Banks just get away with way too much. Thanks for the comment.