Fifth Third Bank Western Ohio charging overdraft fees on pending transactions, ripoff Cincinnati Ohio

Hi Doris,

I read over your complaint and had a few thoughts.

As a bank employee (not 5/3rd) I can never encourage someone to conduct a transaction for more money than is available in his or her account.

As a person, I know there have been a good many times that I did a transaction knowing that I had at least until the business day cutoff to make the deposit to cover the pending transaction.

But when you wrote that 5th 3rd is charging you on PENDING transactions, to me that's a new low.

For example, if I had a customer walk in and wanted to file a complaint about a debit card transaction that didn't belong to them, I'd tell him that there's nothing we can do about it until it actually posts as a transaction to the account. On the same note, 5/3rd doesn't pay out on a pending transaction, just one that has posted to the acct. (I've only been in the banking world for 2 years, so anyone reading this who has more accurate or correct information, i'm open to learning more)

I even wonder if there is something illegal about them charging a fee before the transaction has gone through?

Many business and merchants place a pending hold on an account even greater than the amount of the purchase, then when they batch the transaction it goes through for the correct amount.

I know that 5/3rd's argument is that they sent you disclosures, and that you should always have the money in your account first, but man that is really sneaky of them.

I would close out that account quickly.