# What the fuck, Bank of America? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 13, 2011, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163 "2011-09-13T15:32:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Raza](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raza/32/213_2.png) [@Raza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raza)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2011, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/41 "2011-09-14T21:27:48Z")
Any large corporation (particularly banks) can screw up on occasion, but BoA - like AT&T - have something wrong institutionally, like that one kid at school that everyone knew just wasn’t right in the head. After the BoA “Shinnick” incident, we decided to close our BoA accounts; we weren’t happy with them before, but their response to that incident tipped the canoe. We went down personally to the branch and closed our checking account. Two weeks later we get a notice from them that we’re overdrawn on that account - they tried to debit the monthly service fee, four days after we had closed the account. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2011, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/42 "2011-09-14T22:56:04Z")
OP has my sympathies after our last credit card go around with those fuckers. Can’t wait until my credit union card gets here next week so I can tell BOA to shove theirs. ---
**Author:** ![woodstockbirdybird](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/woodstockbirdybird/32/7905_2.png) [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/43 "2011-09-15T00:03:45Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > If you are going to travel abroad you are supposed to give them your itinerary so they’ll know. > > I actually got off a cruise ship in Costa Rica and used my card at a taco stand. Apparently within hours that number was being used to buy large screen tvs all across S. America. They froze my card and had a new one waiting for me at the cruise ship the next day. They froze my card when I used it in Los Angeles (I live in Oakland). ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/44 "2011-09-15T00:50:08Z")
> [@Biggirl](#): > > I happened to call Bank of America about a change in my homeowner insurance. While discussing this change the CS happens to notice that I am $3000 in arrears. WHAT? What in the hell are you talking about? There must be some kind of mistake. > > Nope, no mistake, I am told. I am $3000 in arrears and they are gonna start foreclosure proceedings unless I send them this money right away. So, I send them the money right away while I check on what the hell went wrong. I look back on my banking records and I see that I have sent them their goddamned payments and what the fuck is there problem? > > I open my mail today. Bank of America has sent me a check for $2672.98 because it was short $110. That’s right, the check should have been for $2762.98. I transposed the numbers. For that they sent back the check (3 months later), put me in arrears for $3000 and threaten me with foreclosure. > > The thing that kills me is, I would have went into foreclosure for $110 and I would not have known _why_ if I hadn’t called them by chance 2 weeks ago. Oh - and let me get this right. You accidentally underpaid… and instead of CASHING THE DAMN CHECK, they sat on it for 3 months and RETURNED IT??? Please tell me you’re looking at refinancing. Rates are as low right now as they were a year ago. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/45 "2011-09-15T00:53:03Z")
Unleash Elizabeth Warren! ---
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/46 "2011-09-15T00:54:26Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > Oh - and let me get this right. You accidentally underpaid… and instead of CASHING THE DAMN CHECK, they sat on it for 3 months and RETURNED IT??? > > Please tell me you’re looking at refinancing. Rates are as low right now as they were a year ago. Yes and yes. Wait, they didn’t sit on the check. They cashed the check, did not apply it to my mortgage and then, three months later, issued me a new check. Stupid fuckers. ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/47 "2011-09-15T01:06:36Z")
> [@Biggirl](#): > > Yes and yes. Wait, they didn’t sit on the check. They cashed the check, did not apply it to my mortgage and then, three months later, issued me a new check. Stupid fuckers. And… it didn’t occur to them to attempt to contact you earlier? Oh wait, this is B of A. Forget I asked. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/48 "2011-09-15T01:11:21Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > And… it didn’t occur to them to attempt to contact you earlier? > > Oh wait, this is B of A. Forget I asked. These are the same morons who suddenly replaced my credit card for unexplained reasons, but didn’t notify us that we needed to resubmit our bank information for autopay. Result: the payment got bounced and they tried to charge us late fees and interest. ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/49 "2011-09-15T01:15:53Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > These are the same morons who suddenly replaced my credit card for unexplained reasons, but didn’t notify us that we needed to resubmit our bank information for autopay. Result: the payment got bounced and they tried to charge us late fees and interest. Yeah - I remember that (I think I posted in that thread also). They did the exact same thing to me, I had autopay set up from THEIR website, but they didn’t carry that over to the new account number, resulting in late fee / interest / and punitive rate. At least in my case they fixed it without complaining. ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/50 "2011-09-15T01:20:46Z")
Gloat, gloat, gloat. I had my debit card refused for a $1800.00 purchase, because I had already made over $200.00 in purchases that morning. I stepped out of line at the cashier, called my bank on the phone, gave them my account number, and my Phone Password, and asked them to approve the purchase, and an additional $500.00 that I expected to need in the next 24 hours. The nice young lady said, “Yes sir, that transaction will be approved now.” It did take me almost a minute to convince the cashier to try again, but it did work. Nyah, nyah, nyah. (I stopped using BofA when they tried to charge me money to get my money out of their bank, twenty five years ago.) Tris ---
**Author:** ![HookerChemical](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/278dde/32.png) [@HookerChemical](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HookerChemical)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/51 "2011-09-15T02:50:29Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > And then they don’t make any effort to contact you. > > Actually I’ve never run into that issue with my BofA card, because I just don’t use it that much. > > But with several other banks, I’ve used my card for something unusual - and they’ve FROZEN it without notifying me. So I’m out and about and shopping and “DECLINED - CONTACT BANK”. > > So I call the bank (Shitibank, I believe this was), they explained it was for my protection because of the earlier unusual transaction, and said flat-out that they do NOT contact the cardholder. Fuck? the? what??? This happened twice, and it cost them my business. > > To be fair, the transactions in both cases were highly unusual (ordering from an overseas vendor, shipping an item to a friend in that country) and SHOULD have been flagged - but the bank really needs to contact the cardholder in that situation. > > Of course Chase hasn’t been that much better. I tried to order something online - renewal of my AVG software I think - and it was declined. Chase sent me a text message asking me if it was legit. I think I just needed to reply to the text message to fix it (though I’d already taken care of it on the phone). > > The next time it happened, they did NOT bother to send me a message. Sheesh. > > Speaking of Chase, they need to change their corporate name. There’s no easy obvious disparaging version, unlike Shitibank or Crapital One. :D. The no-notification cancellation is my experience. I was in Hawaii for my honeymoon. After five days of using the BoA card for nearly everything, it was declined. It turns out that some database was compromised and my number was in the lot, so they canceled my card. No call, no email, no nothing. I switched to my backup credit card with a much lower limit for the remaining two days, but if it had been any longer I would have been screwed. Some time later, I tried to make a large purchase from the electronics department at Wal-Mart. I was outside my typical purchase area, but I was still in the same state. Declined. The Wal-Mart employee had no clue why, so I switched to my backup again. It turns out that BoA flags any electronics purchase at Wal-Mart in the area unless you’re from that area. The Wal-Mart employee is supposed to ask you questions to confirm your identity, but the system clearly didn’t work. Instead, BoA called my father to confirm the purchase was legit. I haven’t used that number in nine years. I didn’t have the card until well after I stopped using that number. I’ve updated all my information online. They have my cell, home phone, home address (and mortgage [FML]), but they’re using the oldest possible record. Seriously, BoA, get your shit together. > [@pbbth](#): > > I can’t really cancel the card as it is my oldest account by several years so it would negatively impact my credit score to do so but I haven’t used the card for more than emergency purposes since the whole kerfluffle and I made my husband switch to Chase with me once we got our joint account set up because I wasn’t willing to deal with their stupid bullshit online any longer. If you’re not looking to make a big purchase soon, canceling a credit card won’t have much impact on your credit rating unless it significantly changes the percentage of credit you’re currently utilizing. This is especially true if you have other cards with a significant history (3-7 years). ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/52 "2011-09-15T18:54:34Z")
> [@HookerChemical](#): > > The no-notification cancellation is my experience. I was in Hawaii for my honeymoon. After five days of using the BoA card for nearly everything, it was declined. It turns out that some database was compromised and my number was in the lot, so they canceled my card. No call, no email, no nothing. I switched to my backup credit card with a much lower limit for the remaining two days, but if it had been any longer I would have been screwed. I’ve been cancelled once by Citibank and once by Amex and they notified me both times…I really fail to understand the “no notification” policy of some others. First time was when I got my brakes repaired. The mechanic at my local service station gave me a bill for $393 and then sent me into the Mini-Mart to pay by credit card. The kid at the counter rang it up for $3.93, and I pointed out the error. Although I suggested running a second slip for $389.07 he seemed to distrust my mental math and ended up refunding me $3.93 from the register and then reran the card for the fulll $393. The amounts set off a red flag and they placed a hold on the card. A Citibank agent left a message on my machine and I called back and cleared everything. The second time was the day I got my Kindle, when you buy books for the Kindle every book goes on as a separate charge, even if they are purchased at the same time. So I browsed Amazon for a while, lined up what I wanted, then purchased, purchased, purchased. About 10 minutes later I got a call from an Amex agent regarding suspiscious charges, apparently if you put through 12 separate charges in less then a minute they suspect robo-fraud. The agent was really nice though and we both got a giggle out of it once I explained the Amazon charges. The only real CC problem I had that pissed me off was with Amex and it was due to a clerical error. When they first started using the 4 digit security codes they linked the WRONG code to my account, which caused me great embarrassment when buying office supplies for my business and even though they realized what the problem was - and that it was THEIR fault -apparently the only solution was to send out a new card, they couldn’t clear the purchase I was trying to make, luckily I had another card. Even then, the account agent was nice enough to review every place where I planned to use the card that week with me - one by one- and she told me which ones checked the security codes and which ones didn’t in order to save me further problems. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2011, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/53 "2011-09-15T23:24:18Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > That’s not to protect you, that’s to protect them. You’re only liable for like 50 or 100 dollars on a stolen card. Wait till they proactively freeze it when you’re on vacation in a foreign country. My bank did that to me. I had to phone them to correct it; they admitted over the phone that yes, they did have it on record that I’d notified them I was going abroad. What with being put on hold, the call cost me £151. The card then malfunctioned again, necessitating two more phone calls (on hold at the end of their working day, then had to phone back the next day) at just over £50 each. I had to ask a friend in England if I could use their card online to buy a tour in Washington DC just because it included lunch, and that was the only way we were going to eat that day. :mad: One of the reasons the charges were so big is that my phone company had also not put me on a roaming network, despite confirming that I did ask them to. :smack: I’m trying to get the money back, but am not hopeful. Paypal also very helpfully stopped my account because I tried to use it abroad; there’s no way of notifying them you’re going on holiday, and the only way to reactivate the account is to have them call your home phone number. ---
**Author:** ![CanvasShoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@CanvasShoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CanvasShoes)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/54 "2011-09-16T04:14:34Z")
I wish they didn’t hold my mortgage. They did something similar to me several years ago. In my case, the check was written correctly, but they’d READ it wrong. Which I don’t understand how they could do since you’d think that someone would check to see if the dollar amount in digits and the written portion matched right? Nope, someone misread a 5 as a 3 or some such and this put me around behind on a mortgage payment. Idiots! And I had to have a super fit to get them to fix their error. Even their manager looked at the check and said “yup, the written amount clearly states the correct amount”. I mean, the mortgage was the same every month, so even if the person looked at the numbers and thought “that says 1300” (or whatever, all they had to do was look at the written portion AND check it against my 5 years of mortgage payments)… sheesh! ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/55 "2011-09-16T13:30:47Z")
> [@CanvasShoes](#): > > I wish they didn’t hold my mortgage. They did something similar to me several years ago. In my case, the check was written correctly, but they’d READ it wrong. Which I don’t understand how they could do since you’d think that someone would check to see if the dollar amount in digits and the written portion matched right? > > Nope, someone misread a 5 as a 3 or some such and this put me around behind on a mortgage payment. Idiots! And I had to have a super fit to get them to fix their error. Even their manager looked at the check and said “yup, the written amount clearly states the correct amount”. I mean, the mortgage was the same every month, so even if the person looked at the numbers and thought “that says 1300” (or whatever, all they had to do was look at the written portion AND check it against my 5 years of mortgage payments)… sheesh! [Just sayin’…](https://www.wellsfargo.com/mortgage/rates?dm=DMIWFHPRAT) - or any other bank, really, the point being it’s possible there are other reasons (other than crappy service) to move your mortgage elsewhere :). ---
**Author:** ![Paranoid\_Randroid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/paranoid_randroid/32/18_2.png) [@Paranoid\_Randroid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paranoid_Randroid)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/56 "2011-09-16T15:07:52Z")
Bank of America _is_ pretty evil. A number of years ago — before we had left BoA — we had a few accounts (one joint and one separate apiece); my income was direct deposited into the joint account so I had to replenish my own occasionally. One day before buying gas I tried to use the BoA iPhone app to transfer money from the joint into my personal account. … Only I made a mistake and instead transferred money from my personal account to the joint account. I bought gas; the following day at school I made multiple purchases for coffee and food. And they made me pay _many_ overdraft fees on all of these, you know, two/three dollar purchases. So — even though the money was in the linked joint account, and even though their fucking app (clearly IMO) didn’t make it sufficiently clear which account was which — they refused to budge on this. I think eventually they agreed to knock off one lousy fee instance. Gee, thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Scuba\_Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/278dde/32.png) [@Scuba\_Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scuba_Ben)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/57 "2011-09-16T15:16:13Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > [Just sayin’…](https://www.wellsfargo.com/mortgage/rates?dm=DMIWFHPRAT) > > - or any other bank, really, the point being it’s possible there are other reasons (other than crappy service) to move your mortgage elsewhere :). At least they’re semi up front about the nuisance fees. But really, the fees don’t scale with the mortgage, they’re charging for doing nothing. ---
**Author:** ![CanvasShoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@CanvasShoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CanvasShoes)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2011, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/58 "2011-09-17T05:30:43Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > [Just sayin’…](https://www.wellsfargo.com/mortgage/rates?dm=DMIWFHPRAT) > > - or any other bank, really, the point being it’s possible there are other reasons (other than crappy service) to move your mortgage elsewhere :). I would LOVE to move my mortgage to WF, they’re my checking and credit card bank, and I’ve been very pleased with most of what they do. (their websites need some IT fine-tuning though :D). But don’t you have to refinance to move your mortgage? Unfortunately I’m in a catch 22 right now, my debt to income ratio has my credit rating at a mere “fair to middlin”. ---
**Author:** ![Crown\_Prince\_of\_Irony](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ed655f/32.png) [@Crown\_Prince\_of\_Irony](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crown_Prince_of_Irony)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2011, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163/59 "2011-09-17T06:22:28Z")
I’ve posted about how pleased I am with my credit union [before](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=14156026&#post14156026), but a quick recap: [ul] [li]Zero monthly fees for anything[/li][li]Free interest-bearing, no min. balance checking - all I have to do is have at least two e-payments set up with them (credit card, utility payments, even payments on their own loans) and use their e-banking twice a month - which I do already[/li][li]They actually _refund_ my third-party ATM fees every month (!!!) - subject to the same simple monthly requirements above[/li][li]They have refunded NSF penalty fees before, _without me even asking_[/li][li]Member owned - I get a frigging _dividend_ check every quarter based on my deposits (usually it’s for only a dollar or two, based on said meager deposits, but still)[/li][li]They aren’t utter douchebags out to cornhole me just to make a profit[/li][/ul] The only drawback is that they don’t operate 24/7 call centers, but I can do without that. Seriously, find a credit union you like and start slowly moving your accounts over. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-the-fuck-bank-of-america/596163.md?page=2)