Charter One ISF charges of $40 a pop for using debit car rather than declining the transaction Ithaca New York

The policy of this bank is to set accounts up automatically as follows: If you attempt rouse your debit card for a purchase hat is greater than your account balance, the transaction is completed and $39.99 is deducted from your account as a service charge. They mail a notice of insurficient funds that you receive, presumably, long after you have made other transactions that each receive the same deduction. They do not call you until a week or two has passed. Then, all of those little transactions add up to hundreds of dollars in service charges.

This happened to me. Upon calling customer service I was told that one of these charges would be forgiven me "as a courtesy." I spoke to this agent's superior. This person forgave me another two ISF charges. I still owed close to $300 in service charges.

Had I been declined the first transaction I would have used a different card and deposited money in my account. Instead, I was left ignorant of all of the $40 charges I was accruing on $7 purchases.

Very few people want to be chrged $40 for the service of being lent a negligable amount of money on their bank cards. There is a good deal of dishonesty in a policy of giving everyone this dubious service without making sure the customer is well aware of the nature of the service.

David van b
Ithaca, New York
U.S.A.