Overdraft fee and debit policy changes
Ahead of (and in response to) a bill in Congress that will limit overdraft and other bank fees, Chase and BofA announced overdraft fee and debit policy changes. The changes for Chase include no overdraft if an account is overdrawn by $5 of less and a maximum of 3 overdraft penalties per day instead of 6. They will also start handling debits chronologically rather than lumping them together at the end of the day and processing the largest amounts first. Chages to take effect in the 1st quarter in 2010. The NYT article also claims that Chase will begin allowing people to turn off automatic overdraft protection, although their disclosure statement seems to indicate this is already possible.
Bottom line: it is still possible to rack up significant overdraft fees using a debit card. Chase and other banks need to stop automatically enrolling customers in these overdraft protection schemes. (WSJ & NYT)
Update: according to this LA Times article, Chase will in fact still process the largest charges first, giving you more of a chance of an overdraft. The article also says Chase is switching to opt-in for overdraft protection, but doesn’t say what will happen to existing accounts (i.e. will they turn it off if you never asked for it in the first place).
Fees & charges | admin September 23, 2009
