Suppose you know you only have a $25 dollars in your account, but you need gas to get to work, groceries to feed you family, and an overdue electricity bill to pay. Wisely, you spend $10 on gas, $15 on groceries, and the next day you pay the $40 light bill, knowing you will take a $35 overdraft fee hit, but willing to take it to feed your family and get to work. The next time you look at your account, you have not one but THREE overdraft fees... instead of owing $35 to the bank, you owe $105, plus the $40 you knew you were going to go over. And you thought you planned it so carefully!
Remember when you were a kid, and you were taught how to balance a checkbook? You entered every amount spent in chronological order, and this is how it would post to your bank account as well. Several months ago, Bank of America sent out a pamphlet in about 3 font lettering describing with little clarity their new policy on posting dates: the largest amount spent in a given time period (3-5 business days) will post FIRST to your account, even if smaller amounts were SPENT first. Bank of America representatives will be more than happy to explain this to you like you are a small child, should you call in confused as to why a $40.00 check you wrote on the 5th posted sooner than a $10.00 debit you made on the first. So, when you call the automated voice system to check your balance, beware that it is a LIE when the computer says, "This is the most up-to-date and accurate information on your account as of today." It is not the most up-to-date information, because they changed the logical chronological posting date rules on you to fit their greedy business model.
Bank of America representatives will also very cheerfully explain that a recent survey was taken and that "most" of their customers agreed that this new policy would be good for them. I would be very interested to see this survey and how the question was worded, as well as what "most" means (none of the Bank of America representatives I spoke to could give me an exact number or percentage or tell me when the survey was administered) Would YOU agree that changing posting dates to benefit the Bank was a good idea?
This new policy is merely a way to cause families to catch several overdraft fees rather than one overdraft. It is yet another way for Bank of America to take away our hard earned money so they can continue to fuel private jets.
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