Complaint Review: Fifth Third Bank - Springdale Ohio

Get this one, because of the $180 in fees that they charged me, The bills that I payed bounced, and they charged me ANOTHER $150 in fees!!!!!! My account only went $46 negative after the $120 in fees and the bills I payed, so they charged me more than 3 times the amount, a rediculous amount, AGAIN!! Especially since the original amount they charged me was rediculous to begin with, and had they never been rediculous, the bills never would have bounced and the new fees never would have existed!!! After screaming at them and telling them that I had contacted the BBB and the Fox Problem Solvers and The FDIC in Washington, they finally agreed to reverse another $100 in fees. At this time they told me that I would need to deposit $98 in my accout to make it positive. Well the next day I had to call them again, because they tried to pull a fast one saying that they meant they were going to take off $100 total, which would mean I had to deposit $160, so I had to argue again to get the other $60 off. This is so rediculous. They told me that supposedly since I opened the account 6 months ago, I have had my account negative a total of almost $7000 dollars, I HAVEN'T EVEN MADE THAT MUCH MONEY IN 6 MONTHS! I AM A COLLEGE STUDENT!!!!!! So all in all, Fifth Third bank is getting $170 of my money for their fees, and this all happened because of my account being negative less than $30, for 9 hours!!!!!! I am closing my account tomorrow, they are theives and liars, I suggest you do the same thing!!!!

I got online on 10/15 and saw that my account was$800+ over drawn. I was in shock! I called 5/3 customer service today and spoke to a lady named Rebecca. As we worked through my last statement I kept asking her if I were overdrawn why did they not decline my debit card. She didn't know. She put me on hold and 10 minutes later she came back and said that is was a courtesy that was initiated by my local branch since we were just good customers to save us the embarrassment of having our card declined! (I value myself and my name, but not that much!) I responded with how did she figure it was a courtesy to me. Of course this was only after she tried to scold me for not checking my account everyday! We went through one day's charges and 3 should have cleared with only one going into over draft. However since they take the largest to the smallest after the first one was processed the others all were assessed a $30 fee the next day! I asked why they did that and her response was that they figure people wanted their house payments,rent, etc., to be paid first. When I asked what difference did it make, at the end of the day the overdraft was going to be the same,she had no answer. Well, it does not take a brain surgeon to figure it is so they can charge more fee the next day. She also confirmed that a $6 per day overdraft fee was assessed for Sat. Sun. and Holidays, even though we are unable to bank that day even if we did want to make a deposit. I asked if they were basically loaning me the money until I made a deposit, since I was such a good loyal customer and she refused to use the word loan, she just said, "We paid it for you." Calling it a loan would make it fall under Truth In Lending laws, and the banks don't want that to happen. I went back through the year from April until today they have charged my account a grand total of $2352.00!! All of this started back in April when I did make a mistake and I did overdraw my account less than $100, with 3 different transactions, one check and 2 ATM/Debits. Of course the check was the largest so they took that out first cause my charges the next day to be $90 instead of$30. I have gone from there until now and if that one incident had not happened I should have right at $2000.00 in the bank! If I refuse to pay these charges, I will be reported to ChexSystem and will not be able to open a bank account, credit destroyed, etc. On September 15 there were Congressional Hearings on this matter with the Banking and Finance Committee. From my research I have found that banks last year made 14 BILLION dollars with these fees last year. (how much was that tax cut Bush gave to help stimulate the economy)? Talk about the Fleecing of America, I would say this rates way up on the list. You can visit bankfee info dot com if you would like more information. This is not just hurting me personally, it's hurting our entire nation! Less money to spend, loss of jobs, loss of income taxes,Federal, State and local. Not counting the unemployment from our government for those out of a job. I know this sounds like I'm really carrying it to the limit, but just think about it. I feel that this is the worse kind of scam that is going right now and it's hurting everyone! I did not enroll in this Courtesy Overdraft Protection, I was not informed about it from my bank in any way. I have banked with Fifth Third for several years and there was no such thing as Courtesy Overdraft Protection. No one called and asked if I wanted it included on any of my accounts, no mail advertising it as a new service,nothing. As of today, I have not heard one word from them about trying to reach an agreement of any kind. Other than one letter from our local branch and one from the President of Fifth Third Bank's office, saying they would contact me within 5 days bank in October I have heard nothing. However:I guess Fifth Third Bank has decided to start harassing me since I have taken a stand and exposing them for the crooks they are. Of course our personal account was closed with OD fees over $1100,and I REFUSE to pay this since they actually owe me. But I've been over this before in another post and in the forum atwww.bankfees.info. We left our business account with Fifth Third Bank at the other branch in Owensboro. The people at this branch have always been very helpful and courteous. I have found when dealing with Fifth Third Bank you *cannot* go to any branch and take care of issues, not even the toll free customer service department (which sucks) you are always told to go to the branch where you *OPENED* the account. Back to the issue of the day. We went to our largest supplier today and was handed a check that was written on 11/11/04 to pay our account. Needless to say I was shocked, I knew that it was not returned to our supplier for NSF. On the back of the check it was stamped with the suppliers bank,Republic Bank, and Fifth Third Bank's stamp. On the front it was very lightly stamped "2 SIG REG". You could barely read it. Immediately called our local branch, they put me on hold, came back and said they had no idea why it was stamped that way or why it was returned. They needed us to bring it in so they could copy it and see what had happened. By the time we got home, our branch was closed but we decided to call the 800 number to see if we could find out more. Customer service said they saw where it was taken out of our account and put back in the next day, other than that they knew nothing else and told us "we should contact our local branch". To top all of this off, they charged our business account $36 to take$400 out of our account and put it back! Plus our suppliers bank charged them $5 for the return check. Out of all the years we have had our business account this has NEVER happened. NEVER! There are four people who can sign on this account,and it only takes one signature. Please, don't tell me it is just a coincidence. I have received no help at all. I contacted the Ohio Division of Financial Services and they wrote a letter to them asking them to correct the problem _____ [email protected] writes: Your recent correspondence regarding problems you are experiencing with Fifth Third Bank was received by the Division of Financial Institutions. Your correspondence has been forwarded to the main office of Fifth Third, with our request that your concerns be addressed and a response provided directly to you within 30 days of this letter. The Division of Financial Institutions is able to assist you to the extent allowed by Ohio law. We pointed out to the bank that the fair treatment of their customers is of concern to us, and they were reminded of the importance of promptly reviewing any legal or service issues, or any other questions you have raised. We can compel responses by a financial institutions only when possible violations of the sections of the Ohio Revised Code administered by the Division are evident. Ohio law does not grant the Division the legal authority to act as advocate or ombudsman on your behalf, nor are we authorized to conduct detailed investigations of individual complaints. We do expect, however, that the institution will review your concerns and respond, as requested, within 30 days. We have asked that they provide us with a copy of their response. If a response is not forthcoming as requested, we will follow up with a reminder letter. I sincerely hope the Division's efforts will help to resolve your complaint. _____ For some reason there has been a surge in this activity from Fith Third Bank. Everyone needs to go back look over their statement as list all the fees imposed to your account, list them with date. See if there is a date that this behavior started to increase.

....and I certainly don't make it a habit to overdraw my checking account. But it does accidentally happen from time to time. The kicker is that you don't know (or realize) until those daily fees start adding up! I too have heard of 5/3rd's nasty customer service. But, because the amount of ATMs and locations (even in Kroger), they were my pick over any other banks. I left PNC (after being with Central Trust all those years) because they became very hard to deal with. So I don't think 5/3rd is any different from other institutions. Ultimately...if you can get into a Credit Union.....

I had the same problems with fifth third bank with overdraft fees there would be times that I would make a deposit within business hours and for some reason that never showed up. I went into the whole because of this thank goodness I had my receipts. The overdrafts fees added up to be $800.00 est. I was in the hospital having my son when all of this was going I found a week later when my husband tried to make a atm withdrawl I had to go to the bank after giving birth I was not pleasant the reinstated some of the fees and argued the rest. Needless to say I am at another bank, I also have other friends who have trouble with fifth third 2 have left and one is in works. Good luck with your adventures with them.

my husband and i both talked to the manager at that branch and they denied the credit over and over. Not only that but they were the one who told us that the fees were charged because of the 60 seconds. They refused any help with the situation.

Oh my god, the same thing happened to me!!!! I opened an account with Fifth Third bank in August of 2004. Nothing about their absurd overdrawn fees was told to me, instead I was given a little book that is all in legal language that only a lawyer could understand. On December 2, 2004, 6 charges on my debit card processed and caused my account to go A TOTAL of $28.90 negative. The largest charge was for $5.35. At midnight the morning of December 3, a direct deposited paycheck was deposited totalling over $300. This deposit was less than 24 hrs after the account had gone negative. Technically if you count it from the end of the business day on the 2nd to midnight on the 3rd, it was 9 hours!!! I expected that they would deduct a fee of $30 as usual for the overdraft, plus $6 for a DAILY OVERDRAFT FEE!!!!!! (that concept is absurd in itself). Instead they deducted $30 for EACH of the 6 transactions totaling $180!!!!! This caused my account to go negative again. They charged me more than 6 TIMES THE AMOUNT MY ACCOUNT WAS OVERDRAWN, FOR 9 HOURS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I called their call center and after fighting with an hour with a manager and telling him that this was the only money I had to live off of for the next week, they took off $60 in fees. This didn't even make my account positive again. I have tried speaking with the call center managers again, and the branch manager at the location in Symmes where I opened the account and they all keep throwing their rules and regulations in my face, remember the unreadable book I told you about before. They even had the nerve to hand me a new copy. All they keep saying is that it is my responsibility to keep track and that they do not reverse fees unless it is a bank error, and reversing the $60 was a COURTESY!!!! So meanwhile I have no food, no gas to get to work, and the CEO is getting an extra $120 in his christmas bonus. How bout some earrings for his wife!!!And here is the kicker, because my account is still negative, I am STILL GETTING CHARGED $6 EVERY DAY!!!!! I have contacted the Better Business Bureau, but Fifth Third is a sponsor, my guess is because of all of the complaints they get, they have to keep the BBB off their backs so they pay them off to keep their mouths shut. I have also just mailed out a letter to the Division of Consumer Affairs at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve in Washington, DC. But this all won't matter anyway because by the time they fix this I will have gotten paid again. But in the mean time, I can't eat, can barely get to work to make that money to pay the CEO for his wifes new earrings. Bottom line, if you have a Fifth Third account, CLOSE IT! If you don't, DO NOT OPEN ONE! They hit you when you are down. How are you expected to pay them when they keep charging you every day. Obviously you don't have any money if you are overdrawn! Not that I would have been overdrawn right now, if they hadn't stolen $120 so far. Thats why they won't reverse more than $60, because if they had refunded one more, I would have been positive. They atleast want their $6 a day! Fifth Third Bank is the worst kind of business, not only do they hit you, but they hit you when they already know that you are down!

Natalie, Those charges do mount up, don't they? Same thing kind of happened to me....I used to have my mortgage payment deducted out of 5/3rd. I re-financed the house and closed, but by mistake, the old mortgage company deducted the payment the following month. Needless to say, I was overdrawn by thousands, and the charges were unreal! I brought my concerns directly to the local level. And yes, the charges were credited in the spirit of good customer goodwill. Your description of the events were confusing. I doubt the facts were EXACTLY as you stated them....your direct deposit was posted a day after you overdrawn your account on 11/29/04. They gave you, in theory, until 11:59pm that day to deposit the $95 so your account is in the black. Don't look at the issue as having missed it by 60 seconds! Why in the world did you not let Springdale take care of the charges??? Quoting: "At this point we went into a branch and asked if they can do anything for us. They also stated no because only the Springdale branch would be allowed to take off the fees. We then asked to close the account and withdrew all the money." Did you go to Springdale? Did they say no? Of course it's too late now. I am 100% sure that if you made an appointment with the manager, stated your concern rationally, you would have been made whole. And....you would have met the person that could help you if something happens again! I wish you good luck.....