Words of the Wise

If you sell things on eBay or Craigslists or other places like that I highly advise that you only accept credit cards or paypal for payment. Why you ask, oh well let me tell you.

There are slimy people out there that are giving fraudulent cashier checks and money orders. Do not think for one minute that just because you ask the bank teller if they are legitimate and they think they are and you make the deposit all will be hunky-dory.

Obviously you can tell that I am a writer… well, maybe you can’t. That is besides the point. I accept payment from clients through my paypal account, I do this for protection really. I have been ripped off by enough people that owe me money and have not wanted to pay, have paid with a bad check or a money order that I am as cautious as I can be and still make a living being self employed.

Though paypal and I have had our differences they do what they can to help make sure that fraud is not being committed with their service. My bank advised me that if you do anything on line, with eBay or paypal they recommend setting up a second and separate checking account because of all the crap they have seen. So we did just that.

My husband received two checks. We thought that they were cashier checks, the bank said they were international money orders. Anyway, to be safe, we deposited them and had a hold put on them to make sure that they cleared and all was peachy keen.

Last night I log into our account to see where we are at and if those items had infact cleared… well they didn’t. Turns out that they were fraudulent. As that I trust few people I wasn’t surprised really, that is the point of that separate account. What I was surprised about was that the bank not only took the credit that they had given for the deposit, which was held for 7 days to make sure it cleared, they then charged us the amount of those two checks in the new account as well as froze our personal account and charged us that amount on that account as well. In the end what the Loss Prevention Department at our bank was trying to tell me that we owed them almost $4000 because the deposit we had made was returned.

No matter how many times I went over it with this woman she kept telling me we owed that money because we got a credit for it. When the deposit came back they had to take that away. Ok… I got that, I was good with that. But to be triple charged for something that I never had access to, never spent, never took, never touched NO I was not good with that!

She decided to transfer me to a “manager”. What she did was send me to another department to this poor man that tried to help me, but is wasn’t his department. In the end I think he was as upset as I was and he said, “You have to call Loss Prevention back.” While the phone rang and I prayed to not get the same woman as I held back the tears and tried to not drop the phone because I was shaking so bad this wonderful woman named DeeDe answered that phone… and she helped me… she understood what I was saying, and she fixed the problem. What had been done never should’ve been done and all will be okay. We are of course out $70 for overdraft fees that we shouldn’t have but because of what they did we ended up with them, but she couldn’t return them, I have to go to the branch where the account was opened and talk to the manager and explain what happened and ask for the fees back.

I think I will let my husband take care of that. I am done dealing with the bank for now.

BUT.. the purpose here is that I want to educate you on your banking and what is allowed and what isn’t.

First, when you make a deposit at your bank, you become financially responsible for that deposit. So if you are in doubt over ANY deposit that you EVER make ask them to place a hold on that deposit to make sure that it clears. The hold is usually five or seven days. It may seem like a lot, but it will save you a lot of money.

If you don’t place the hold and you spend that money and it comes back, you have to make up that money and all fees that are associated with that money. But only for the amount of the deposit.

So in my case, I got the “credit” but we had the hold in it. So when it ended up coming back all the bank should’ve done was take away that credit. All the “money” was there so it should’ve put our account back to the balance that was there prior to that deposit.

What they tried to do was take the credit, which they should’ve and then charge me that amount as well. Which they SHOULD NOT have done. Then on top of that they looked at our personal account we had with them and then charged that account the amount as well. Which they SHOULD NOT HAVE done.

Now, had I not been on top of our finances and called the bank until I got someone to listen to me and go through it with me, we would’ve ended up owing the bank almost $4000 erroneously. And do you think that they would’ve called and said, “I am so sorry for our f**k up here is your 4 grand back.” Ummmm… no. I like our bank, I think they are great… let’s be realistic.

So my advice to you is this:

Have a separate account for anything that you do on the internet.

Have a hold placed on ANY deposit you are not sure of – I don’t care if it is check from your Uncle.

Stay on top of your finances. – That is what online banking is for!

Do not let up until you find someone that will listen to you!