Fifth Third Bank Western Ohio charging overdraft fees on pending transactions, ripoff Cincinnati Ohio
Fifth Third Bank is now charging their normal overdraft fee for "pending transactions". I had $66.00 in overdraft fees two days ago. I was not overdrawn so I called the bank.
I was told that is how they are doing it now and I received the information in my statement so since I was informed they would not reverse the fee.
I informed them that I use the internet to view my statement and was told the same information is there. I reviewed it and found nothing that specifically says that overdraft fees will be charged if your pending transactions are in the negative as opposed to posted transactions.
I also reviewed the insert in my statement and it was the same as the information online. I have spoken with 9 other 5/3 checking customers and none were aware of this. I have had many a financial struggle due to Fifth Third and this is the straw that broke the camels back.
I understand you are supposed to have the money in the bank in order to use it but I went to the grocery and then deposited my check and because the grocery amount put me approx. $35.00 in the negative in my pending transactions before the deposit I had to give Fifth Third $66.00 of my hard earned dollars. And as usual, they don't care.
As far as I am concerned this was just another creative way of Fifth Third getting money from people that don't have it.
Doris
Union, Ohio
U.S.A.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Kevin
Willmar,Minnesota,
U.S.A.
od charges on pending transactions?? close the acct
#2Consumer Suggestion
Fri, January 12, 2007
Hi Doris,
I read over your complaint and had a few thoughts.
As a bank employee (not 5/3rd) I can never encourage someone to conduct a transaction for more money than is available in his or her account.
As a person, I know there have been a good many times that I did a transaction knowing that I had at least until the business day cutoff to make the deposit to cover the pending transaction.
But when you wrote that 5th 3rd is charging you on PENDING transactions, to me that's a new low.
For example, if I had a customer walk in and wanted to file a complaint about a debit card transaction that didn't belong to them, I'd tell him that there's nothing we can do about it until it actually posts as a transaction to the account. On the same note, 5/3rd doesn't pay out on a pending transaction, just one that has posted to the acct. (I've only been in the banking world for 2 years, so anyone reading this who has more accurate or correct information, i'm open to learning more)
I even wonder if there is something illegal about them charging a fee before the transaction has gone through?
Many business and merchants place a pending hold on an account even greater than the amount of the purchase, then when they batch the transaction it goes through for the correct amount.
I know that 5/3rd's argument is that they sent you disclosures, and that you should always have the money in your account first, but man that is really sneaky of them.
I would close out that account quickly.