I'm writing to warn any prospective customers about Compass Bank's shameful practices. I have read quite a few reports here about people who have been unfairly charged NSF fees. While that scenario does not apply to me (I'm very careful not to allow my account to get low and I never write checks—ever), just as a customer who has been banking with them for a couple of years, I have some complaints.
First of all: I always deposit cash. Liquid cash. Their policy is that even though they have your cash IN HAND, they HOLD the funds until midnight of the following business day.
That means that if I walk into the bank with $1,000.00 at 9:00 AM on Monday and deposit it into my account, I don't see a DIME of that money until 12:00 AM on TUESDAY. I don't understand that. There are no checks to clear, there is no paperwork to do, nothing to verify and no one who needs to be contacted. It's MY money, it's in MY account, it should be MINE to use right away, right?
No. And if you make a purchase before midnight, you WILL get dinged with an NSF fee. This should be illegal.
ADDITIONALLY; they hold your cash an EXTRA day if you deposit it using the ATM machine. That means that if you deposit that $1k on Monday at 9AM, they don't check it until close of business on Monday afternoon. They 'process' the money on TUESDAY and then post it to your account on WEDNESDAY... Supposedly at midnight. This is still cash, we're talking about—liquid cash.
Secondly: I have had CASH TRANSFERS into my account from other places. This means the liquid assets are given directly to them from another bank. The money is cleared and subtracted immediately from the other account.in addition to the 'until midnight' hold policy, it is ALSO their policy to charge YOU, the recipient, $15.00 to receive the funds. That's right: they CHARGE you to keep your money.
In the TWO times I've done this; they made a mistake and charged me TWICE for the $15.00 fee. I can not get them to reverse this. I have read their documentation thoroughly and they were supposed to charge it ONCE but they did it twice and I can never get someone on the phone with the authority to fix their mistake. So I simply do not perform transfers in this way anymore. They got to keep my extra $30.00 for free, it seems.
Now, let me also add that yesterday at around 3:00 PM I made an $800.00 deposit into my account. When I deposited the money, I confirmed again with the teller 'Today is 13 May. I will see this money in my account at 12:00 AM on 14 May, correct?'
'That's right.' she told me.
'Okay, just making sure because I have a purchase to make first thing in the morning and I've had it happen where I checked at midnight and the money wasn't there before.'
'No, it'll be there, ' she said.
'Okay, Thank you.' and I left.
Let me point out now that it is 12:51 AM on 14 May. The money still isn't in my account. This is not the first time this has happened... As a matter of fact, it seems to happen EVERY TIME I've checked. I know from prior experience that it will not post until 6:00 AM.
This is aggravating. I have an important purchase to make online using my debit card. I wanted to do it tonight so that it could be shipped out first thing in the morning. If I *do* attempt to make said purchase EVEN THOUGH THE FUNDS SHOULD BE THERE, I know I will be dinged with an NSF fee, an overdraft fee and whatever other fees they choose to tack on.
And I know I will not be compensated for their failure to follow their own policy and RELEASE MY OWN FUNDS. We're still talking about cash here.
I have opened an account with Wachovia bank and will close my account, in person and in writing as soon as I receive my debit card for my new account. I checked their practices and they seem to be on-par with industry standard so you may want to switch to either them or a bank that's like them.
0 comments