Banks change policies to please customers

JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Bank of America, two of the country’s biggest banks, have decided to listen to customer demand by revamping how they process debit card transactions and how they handle overdraft protection.

Chase and Bank of America are reforming the excessive fees that can occur when an account is overdrawn. Banks are giving customers more control over their money by letting them choose whether they want the bank to help them when they exceed their limit or to immediately decline their card.

Instead of automatically enrolling customers into the overdraft protection program, all customers will be given a choice of whether to opt in.

“Every single one of our millions of customers will be asked if they want overdraft protection,” said Nancy Norris, vice president of media relations for JPMorgan Chase.
“If they want the bank to cover purchases that exceed their account limit, they will have to opt in.

“Other banks are going the other way; their customers will have to indicate they want to opt out.”

Norris said this method is more customer-friendly.

“Because of the economy, this is a way for people to tell us what they want,” Norris said.

If customers choose to opt out of the program, the debit card will be rejected because of insufficient funds. According to a news release, Chase will continue its current policy of not allowing customers to withdraw more cash from an ATM than they have available in their account.

Personal checks will be returned for insufficient funds. An insufficient fee will be charged for these transactions, but an additional covering fee will not be charged, Norris said.

Chase’s current policy regarding debit cards is to process the transactions from highest dollar amount to lowest. Chase’s new procedure will be to process debit card transactions chronologically, in the order they happen.

Chase customer and senior Miranda Ryals said she is glad Chase is changing their policy.

“The ATM balance was different than what it said online,” Ryals said. “How am I supposed to know?”

The new policy will affect how paper checks are processed as well.

“Checks don’t have a timestamp so they will continue to be processed from highest to lowest,” Norris said. “The reason for this is because most checks are written by our customers for important items, such as rent and car payments.”

The new policy changes will take effect the first quarter of 2010.

Senior Katie Plant said she feels overdraft protection is helpful.

“I like the overdraft protection instead of accumulating all the fees,” she said.

Senior Ilea Shipp had a problem at Old National Bank when she was charged $70 for writing a check one cent over the amount in her account. Shipp has her Chase overdraft protection linked to her savings account.

“Why wouldn’t customers want the overdraft protection?” Shipp said.