Following the recent lawsuit filed against BBVA Compass Bank and general concern surrounding deceptive bank practices involving overdraft fees, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has called for tight restrictions on fees charged for overdrawn checking accounts. Separately, many of the nation’s largest banks have already announced their plans to revisit overdraft policies.
However, FDIC Chair Sheila Blair has raised the concern that banks may not be going far enough in their restrictions of these fees. She has called on the Federal Reserve to finalize the rulemaking portion of the overdraft reform, but the Federal Reserve maintains that it is still unsure …read more

BBVA Compass, the U.S. arm of the Spanish Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentina, faces a lawsuit from irate customers and their attorneys over its overdraft policies. In the lawsuit filed earlier this week, Houston restaurant Fat Butter has accused BBVA of deceptive practices, including posting debits out of order to increase overdraft fees.
 
A specific excerpt from the lawsuit claims that BBVA posted a large debit first so that it could claim overdraft fees and then posted several smaller debits, even though these transactions were not made in this chronological order. The attorney for Fat Butter has stated that these practices are …read more

Bank of America has long been criticized for how the company handles overdraft fees. On Monday, the bank finally decided to do something about it. Their changes to their overdraft fee rules are aimed at helping customers avoid racking up big overdraft penalties.
Starting on Oct. 19, Bank of America won’t charge an overdraft fee when the overdraft is less than $10 and is in that state for less than a day. Overdraft fees will only be maxed out at four times per day and customers will find it easier to opt out of overdraft protection. Additionally, Bank of America will …read more