Reasons Why I Hate Sun Trust
#1. They reorder your purchases to cause you to bounce more transactions.
For example, let's say I have $100 in my account.
On Monday, I buy something that costs $5, and something that costs $10.
On Tuesday, I buy something that costs $5, and something that costs $15.
On Weds, I buy something that costs $20, and something that costs $70.
If these go through in the right order, it would look something like this:
$ Paid Account balance
$100
$5 $95
$10 $85
$5 $80
$15 $65
$20 $45
$70 $-25
So oops, that last $70 thing puts me in the red, and I get charged an overdraft fee. Right? Not with SunTrust!
They leave things pending for days, and then reorder them from highest to lowest. So it will go like this:
$ Paid Account Balance
$100
$70 $30
$20 $10
$15 $-5
$10 $-15
$5 $-20
$5 $-25
Delightful, huh? They've done this to me several times now, and I keep vowing to change banks, but keep putting it off. There was even a news story recently about banks doing this, and Sun Trust was listed as "organizing charges in whichever order they choose". Gotta love companies with "ethics"!
So Thanks to the above system, when I messed up and paid another bill after forgetting that I'd already paid my electric bill (it didn't post to my account for over a week), I should have gotten one overdraft fee on Thursday when the second bill went through. Nope, I got 5. The McFlurries ($2.37 each) that I bought on Monday and Tuesday (according to Sun Trust, those somehow come AFTER Thursday?) each cost me a $36 overdraft fee. There were a total of 5 of those fees. And then this week, ANOTHER $36 "extended overdraft" fee, because my account had been negative for several days. I only get paid once a week, of course it is going to stay negative until Thurs rolls around again!
So what was left of my check this week? $25.
Reason #2.
If your account goes negative, they will deactivate your debit card.
Without telling you.
This leads to your sick, exhausted, tired self, who has not been able to buy food all week standing in line for half an hour at Wal-Mart at 10pm on a Thursday night, only to have your card declined, and no way to pay for your stuff.
This may make you cry, because damn, if there was ever a week when you needed that Cherry Garcia, this is it. You may go home and rant to your friendly next door Ashlee about the injustices of the world, and she will probably give you some cat food, so that your cats will not eat your nose while you sleep.
(This will not happen, though, because you will not sleep. Yay for being sick for like a month straight!)
3. Just in case the above is not enough fun, they will also occasionally send you NEW debit cards in the mail, without warning, because of "security issues." This means your card will not work. You will find this out by standing in line at Wal-Mart with a cart full of groceries again, because seriously, who has time to check their mail more often than once a week, if lucky?
So, I'm shopping for a new bank, friends! Any suggestions?
posted by Crystal @ 2:24 PM
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