Webster Bank review: predatory fees 6

I am another one of the casualties of the big grab for my hard earned money by Webster Bank. Like the other comments on this site I have had the same problems. Until I read these comments I felt like some kind of criminal with all these excessive charges eating away at our hard earned money.

I recently deposited a $2, 400 pay check into our account which should have cleared right away but of course it did not. Unknown to me it was "held" for 3 business days. In the meantime, I paid bills and bought groceries all with a bank balance showing for what I had deposited with the appropriate amounts withdrawn for each transaction. Suddenly, out of nowhere I started getting OD fees - 12 total at $37.00 each against these amounts that had cleared against a positive balance. Apparently the bank "cleared" my debit amounts and checks but penalized me $37.00 each for the "privilege" of allowing me to use my money.

I am sick about this... In good times it's bad enough when this happens (this is by far not the first time that I have been ROBBED) but as an idependent contractor whose income levels have dropped 70% I need every penny I've earned to catch up with my life. My husband suffered a huge decrease in his paycheck recently due to corporate "re-structuring" so this is really hurting us.

I have believed all along that Webster Bank lines up the payments they see coming up in a way that will line their pockets by "bouncing" incoming payments in the "right" way. Until I read one of the comments on this site I thought I was alone in thinking this.

In my opinion this a legalized theft ring and I've had enough. I will be switching banks as soon as I can arrange everything but the question is where does one go to avoid this kind of practice?

My understanding is that Bank of America recently was in hot water for this practice ... how long will it take to protect all of us little guys from a "smaller" predator?

Yes, I agree with the other posters here, Webster Bank is EXTREMELY predatory with their fees.

Their account brochures say that the first $100 of an ATM deposit is made immediately available. I deposited a check on Friday. I took most of the $100 out. I deposited another check Saturday. The ATM receipt said $75 was "available". I went to the ATM that Monday and got an account balance receipt. It still said $75 was available. I took $60 out, and the receipt slip said $15 was available. An hour later, my wife calls the info line and it says we are $45 overdrawn! And, sure enough, Webster took $37 that night, so Tuesday the account was $82 overdrawn. I went to the bank with all the receipt slips with positive available balances, and one of the managers says "you have to IGNORE ATM receipts(!)" and refused to refund my money, saying I should've waited for the checks to clear and the available balance needs to match the actual balance on the ATM receipts to avoid overdraft fees. Can this be legal? The ATM receipt is a written document from the bank, and she tells me to ignore them?!? I travel a lot and cannot check my balance on the computer most days. Does anyone know if I have legal recourse?

Let's say you wrote a check and mailed it today. Will this check amount post immediately out of your online account later today? Ofcourse not! The same principle applies when you charge an item on your debit card or withdraw your funds electronically through the ACH network. If you closed your account at Webster Bank, the same thing will happen at another bank or a credit union! The common sense rules are:

1. Make sure you have money in your account before you spend it or pay your bills.
2. Record all your transactions in your register book.
3. Look at your transaction history online to see if your item has been paid.
4. Man up and accept responsibility for your own actions.

In today's world of electronic transfers, three days is excessive. Webster Bank has a history of this penny anti crap. Let me tell you my story. Five years ago my daughter opened a checking account for college. We deposited a small amount in it and after about a year received a notice that the account was overdrawn. I contacted them and said the account has never been used, how can it be overdrawn? Well it seems they made a mistake and set her up with an account that had monthly fees of $6. So before she was able to accumulate any money, the bank had taken her small deposit for fees to process zero checks. No phone calls, no letters, just a bank taking advantage of a 16 year old kid. Well, I happened to carry a checking account that had an average balance of $20-25K in it, for over 5 years. I told them to rebate the money into her account or that would be it for my checking. They said sorry, there is nothing we can do, and I withdrew the money and opened a checking account elsewhere.

Note: My daughter worked at peoples bank and she told me that by law a bank, if they see a customer with a high balance in a non-interest bearing account, must alert them of the available options. Not once, in twenty years did they ever notify me. I really didn't care as my balance for the early years varied and I didn't want to get caught in Webster's minimum balance scheme.

At the same time I had a home equity line of credit that went back to 2000. At that time I had a mortgage, owed the town $50K in back taxes from a real estate company I owned, and had debt up to my eye balls. They loaned me $104K. It was a ten year note. It recently came due and they sent me a notice in a nondescript envelope. Since I was carrying maybe $2200 on this note and was paying it back in small bites, I had no reason to suspect this was anything more than the typical monthly statement. Wrong. By chance I happened to see a funny charge online and called. I was notified that the note was due and that I need to either close it out or reapply to avoid any closing fees. I luckily had time. I made a $150 payment, re-applied and several weeks went by and I did not hear anything. I figured the loan was extended, as that is all I wanted to do. Wrong. I called them to be sure everything was set and was told the loan was denied. I asked why and after several days of bs I finally heard it was because my name wasn't on the deed. My credit score was 768. I said fine and we changed the deed. I had apply again. Two more weeks go by with no word. I call and find out it was denied again. I tell the local account officer that if the bank does not want business, just tell me and I'll go elsewhere. Another week passes and the loan department calls and they explain that I had two liens on the property. I explained that I was travelling most of the following week and would check the town records the following Friday. I also told the account specialist that I would make another good faith payment to reduce the balance. The following week, as agreed, I check this out and sure enough there are two liens. One was resolved two years ago and the other was unknown to myself or my my wife. It was some odd medical bill for an emergency room situation with my daughter who was injured in 2004 in a HS basketball game. We thought the school paid, the school thought we paid. I paid the whopping $580 last week, on the spot. I then call the account specialist, as agreed, on the same Friday, and left a message that all was taken care of and that the paperwork was forthcoming and would be filed with the town. No return call follows. I leave several more messages and still nothing. I then go online to be sure the payment went through for the $580 and viola, the bank cleverly auto drafted, without my authorization, the balance of $1279 from my checking, applied it to the home equity, drawing it down to zero, thereby closing the account, or so it seemed. And this was done on the 25th. The day I returned from my trip was the 28th. The account specialist agreed to my schedule on the 21st. So she went behind my back, while I was on business travel, and withdrew money from my checking to satisfy the loan. I checked with my attorney and was told the bank can and will do this using some 100 year old law that is never used, except by Webster apparently. Now, before you start drawing any conclusions, let me fill you in on my current situation. I own my house free and clear. I have zero debt. No mortgage, no car payment, no credit card debt, nothing. Debt free, credit rating of 768, house and property worth $500K, $150K+ in stocks, bonds, savings, checking, retirement, etc. and I'm a young guy. Webster tells me they can extend my loan at a reduced rate of $10K max. limit. I told them to stick it and the same was about to happen with my business checking/savings Webster account that happened with my personal checking. It was going to go bye, bye. I was told they were sorry, but that nothing could be done. The best aprt is that during the ten years of this note I was never delinquent, never ran the balance up to more than $20K, always paid it down within a few months, and basically underutilized the note. The strange thing was that Webster could never get the auto-pay feature to work correctly. I'd set it to transfer $150 per month and it would work fine, until I zeroed the account, which was often. Once zeroed it went back to interest only. Once I borrowed again, I'd have to go back in a reset it to $150 as their pathetic system was incapable of doing this automatically. That is until the note came due and it magically adjusted from interest only to $1279. Absolutely amazing. I was told a letter was sent advising this would happen. No such letter was sent. I was told the loan specialist left several messages this week. No messages were recorded at work on our sophisticated system or at home on our Internet based system. We have received plenty of other calls, just none from Webster. And our local officer is very, very, very, very, very sorry for all the inconvenience, but there's nothing she can do... That's been the common theme through all this, their admitted incompetence, tempered by an apology, followed by an unnecessary fee. I can only conclude a couple of things. One, it's pretty obvious why the banks are in such trouble given their previous practice as compared to their current practice. And two, it's also very, very, very, very obvious that Webster Bank is devoid of funds. My advice is to withdraw any monies you have sitting in their vault. At the very least, you'll be saved from being nickel and dimed to death from their fraudulent hidden fees.

It's unfortunate that banks are allowed to post transactions in any order they see fit. I would suggest in the future to use a credit union.

There is no reason why you should have to pay $477 in fees. I would do every thing I could to get as many of those fees waived, (if you haven't done so already, and then take business elsewhere, as I mentioned above.

Good luck...

They are notorious for paying the largest check first so they can charge you $37 per check for uncollected funds, because they pay the checks before they clear the deposits. They paid a large check first and charged me $37 each for four smaller ones that would have been covered by available funds if they paid those first. That is their M.O. Hate that bank. Have to keep my business account open because I have an automatic deduction each month paying off a line of credit loan with them. I have closed my personal account.