Key Bank USA Overdraft Fees Consumer Reviews - Page 2

ROY, UTAH -- Stay away from Keybank. They will keep pending your deposits until you get some overdraft charges. What kind of bank is greedy? When is enough money enough? People make deposits to make purchases. Not to purchase then make deposits. They will not do your transactions in order. If they can get overdraft fees from you believe me they will see to it before they even acknowledge that you made deposit before that. Save yourself the agony and do business with a more reputable bank. Keybank is a scam.

I was with another bank for four years and made the biggest mistake by trying KeyBank. When you use debit cards with most banks, you are able to access your available balance by phone or the computer. Example, last week I made a purchase at Mcdonald's and a couple of other restaurants during the work week. I checked my account online and those charges showed pending and were deducted from the available balance. So I know where I am at right? Well that was until this week.

I trusted the available balance and used my card for some grocery shopping. My available balance was 20.00. The next evening, my account showed I had 160.00. I knew this was wrong and checked the account again in the morning. It said -2.69. I was like what in the hell. I called the bank and they said it could have been a debit that hard posted late and they adjusted the overdraft fee. I put a few bucks in to bring it current. The next evening my direct deposit of 111.00 went in as available balance. I spent 40.00 and my balance was 71.00. I checked my online account when I got home and it was -87.00. I was hit for four overdraft fees at 147.00.

I called customer service and they refused to help. They said the restraint debits I had earlier that week had hard posted. I told them I was misled by their available balance on the online banking. He told me to keep a ledger. Needless to say that's the whole reason you use a debit card and online banking, so you don't need a damn ledger. Anyway I called the branch manager and she reversed all the fees except one. She tried to tell me the I needed to keep better track. The bank I was with for four years, I used my debit card like a sword and the available balance online was always correct. Never, not one overdraft. I will be returning to that bank. Sorry I ever tried Key.

WASHINGTON -- Recently I have been put into a cycle of non-stop fees from KeyBank..... I have call the 800 key to your ph number and talked with several people... including supervisors,,,, and have gone into various branches..... A couple of things to warn customers about..... I get fees for overdraft and some may indeed be valid... but the design of how deposits and withdrawal are done is entirely made to benefit the bank and not their customer..... And when I asked for a document in writing of how the bank does these transactions (which I have requested more than six times), I never get anything sent to me....

Finally a cust. service person explained the process to me.... But she then ended with ..."it is at KeyBank's discretion".... I asked what does that mean... She said ... that really KeyBank can deposit and withdraw from an account in whatever order they deem.... and that the guidelines set forth can be changed by KeyBank at anytime..... I am getting fees for fees..... I am getting fees for not pending activity..... Not that day at least but it always works out that I get a fee the next day..... typically due to the order of either deposits get posted or withdrawal come out .....

It's outrageous!!!! I have gotten probably over 10 fees in past few months.... Most if not all are due to posting policy...... I have gotten a fee..... when my end of day balance was positive... And the next morning balance was positive..... HOW is this possible???

I just don't get it... And living check to check... it is almost impossible to break this cycle..... and the bank has no compassion..... if I did need to use a bank..... I wouldn't...... I just read online article that stated that banks have collected 60 BILLION in overdraft fee since the beginning of the year..... WE THE people put up money to bail out the banks this year.... and WE will be paying it back..... I know... Key may not have gotten a bailout..... but they are profiting from the current situation.... #1 in customer service as stated on their website...... I DO NOT SEE IT!!!!!

Key is notorious for gouging overdraft fees for deviant reasons. For the fourth time, they have gone through and posted a transaction improperly, sending my account over. I actually deposited well over 50 dollars into my account, and had two tiny purchases of less than 10 dollars each. When I looked at my account, it said that I had 38 dollars. The next day, there were two overdraft charges for these transactions. So I called the bank. I talked to someone who had a lot of attitude issues, and basically told me that it isn't her fault I don't write everything down.

Actually I do, but that is besides the point. They actually retro-posted a charge to my account, which is what made it over. Even though the charge wasn't there on the 21st, on the 22nd it miraculously shows up with a date of the 19th. I had a positive balance, and it should have posted on the 22nd. But they posted it to a date when I didn't have the money in the account for some stupid reason. When I asked about it, they swear up and down that it should have shown up on my online banking, but it didn't.

I snarled at them enough to make them return one of the bank fees, but I can't think for the life of me how this is even legal. If it goes through your account on the 22nd, how can they go back and post it to the 19th? Not to mention, the online banking said that I had a positive amount in my account. How is this even possible? It seems like their online banking is meant to deceive customers into thinking they have money, but really the bank shows something completely different. I highly recommend avoiding this bank at all costs. Even if they give you a free GPS or iPod, it is not worth the time and money you will spend on the phone fixing their mistakes.

****UPDATE*** There seems to be a lot of people indicating that I am not careful about transactions. I am very careful. I do keep really good records, and am always aware of how much I have in my account. I have had this problem with the bank before, where I know there is money in the account, and I have to go in and prove that it is actually in the account. They always reverse it, but it is still a huge problem. I think they are hoping people will think they have done something wrong, when they actually haven't. There was money in my account to cover a transaction on the 19th, as well as before.

TALLMADGE, OHIO -- Well, KeyBank has shown their true colors yet again this week. Yes, I said week because that's how long it's taking me to attempt to recover my own money!! I've added up all the overdraft charges for the year and it's well over $1600.00. Now, add this week's, and it's another $200.00 so far... But they're not done yet, because I already know there's at least 4 more coming. Apparently, when you accidentally go in the negative (by.04 cents), you might as well hand over your children. That being said because you can no longer afford to feed them, because your card got declined at the grocery store!!

**FYI** If you go over your balance, they add up everything for the day. If your TOTAL is over, they bounce every single check, debit, etc. for that day. Then, the next day, they take out their "fees" first, then they overdraft more things. They disguise this "bend over" process as "Time sensitive Payments". When you try to get answers at the Call Center, they refer you to your home branch. I can no longer go into my home branch for fear of being arrested. The manager there smiles and tells me "So sorry, they are legitimate charges" then gets up from her desk and leaves her chubby hole.

Do you have enough time to hear more? That was only one incident out of 11 THIS YEAR. When I went to a branch that was closer to my work, the manager agreed with me, was going to reverse the charges. Then noticed I had a different home branch. He told me to go there, explain it to them, show them my PROOF (their own printouts) and they will reverse the charges. In the 12 minute drive to my "Home" branch, I was wrong again. Nothing was done to help me. I was dismissed like an ugly step-child with head lice. My "home" when I was growing up was a peaceful, encouraging, thoughtful home. "Home" to KeyBank is where "they hang YOUR hat up".

BUFFALO, NEW YORK -- You are all going to love this one. I cannot believe any business could be as screwed up as this, but I had a KeyBank checking account when I lived in Buffalo. I had about $1500 worth of Overdraft Protection, as a line of credit. When I moved out of state, I maxed it out. KeyBank would not close my checking account until the line of credit was paid off. It took me a while.

In the mean time, I was being charged $5.95 per month in service charges on the checking account, which put the account into the negative, which meant that every few months Overdraft Recovery would start demanding about $75-$85 from me. There was no other activity on the account during all this time, except for my paydown of the line of credit.

Finally -- this is January 25, 2005, according to my records, I got a human being in Overdraft Recovery to zero out the service charges. Quote: "They should never have been charged in the first place." On June 6, 2005, I called Overdraft Recovery and confirmed with them that my account was marked "Nothing Owed."

Fast forward to early August, 2006. I finally get the line of credit on my KeyBank checking account paid off. After about two hours on the telephone with their customer service (but that's another story), I finally found out who to talk to, and then wrote a letter to my former branch, stating that I wished to close my checking account. There was a small credit balance, because I had slightly overpaid the line of credit. KeyBank owed me $19.00, and I requested that they send me a check.

Did they do that? Oh, no. Instead, someone somewhere at KeyBank found the old Overdraft Recovery debt -- the one Overdraft Recovery told me TWICE had been charged off and marked "Nothing Owed" -- and sent it to a collections agency. So now I am getting calls from the collections agency, who want me to pay $85 and change. Why? According to this collections agency, I have an old debt with KeyBank Overdraft Recovery, dating back to January 2005.

Remember January 2005? That's the date KeyBank Overdraft Recovery told me I did NOT owe them money. I guess the "not" must have dropped out of the correspondence somewhere along the line. KeyBank is an absolute nightmare. Whoever you are reading this, never, never have anything whatsoever to do with them.

KeyBank charged me $123.00 on a $5.00 overdraft. I opened this account and then found out that they (1) sent bills and charged my account before the bills were sent and then overdrafted my account; (2) as a result I tried to close the account because they charged me overdraft charges for each bill and would not waive the charges; (3) I was told I could not close my account early unless I paid an early closure fee! So I left the account open until six months later when I wrote a check for $75 to close the account.

I was incorrect that the balance had $75 but instead had $70; thus the $5.00 overdraft. They charged me an initial overdraft charge of $37, then $28.50 for the next three months. They called me on some anonymous number and did not leave any message until I finally answered the anonymous call and discovered just today that they charged me $123.00 on the $5.00 overdraft. They will not waive any of the fees. I just went to KeyBank and deposited the full amount. What a rip off. DO NOT USE KEYBANK!!!

First, my account was low because my direct deposit didn't go through. Not knowing this because, unlike some banks, Key refuses to send an automated email called a low balance alert. Anyway, thinking I had money I made a few small purchases on Saturday and Sunday. On Wed. morning I get a call that I need to put $$ in my account. When I looked it up online I had 8 $37 OD charges on the same day. It appears they used the old trick of taking the larger amount out first and continued. Why they waited 3 days on some is beyond me. A few charges were under $5.

When I asked for a reversal of the 8 OD fees, they just said "it's your responsibility but we will take off 3 fees". I asked why they kept accepting the debit card transactions when the account was overdrawn and they gave a lame story about MasterCard and merchants not sending them in. There is no reason in this electronic age that they could not take notice and refuse to honor charges. KeyBank sucks - I should have closed my accounts a long time ago.

WATERTOWN, NEW YORK -- My husband is currently serving in the US Army. He was on his way home for leave from overseas when he called to tell me his account needed more money because an international call cost more than he thought. I transferred money over although the account was still in the good. The next day it was -$13. I transferred more money over and the following day it was -$83. I called the bank and had 2 fees out of 5 refunded. I explained he was traveling overseas with no way to check his account and when I checked it it had been fine. I transferred $200 into his account and with the 2 refunded fees the online account said he had a little over $100.

The next day it was -$180. I went to the bank and they explained to me how it works in their system and why we were charged 10 overdraft fees. I gave up arguing because at the time I had thought more fees had been refunded because our negative balance had gotten smaller. The following day it, the negative balance, had increased. We had been charged a fee for it being negative for over 5 days which I expected. But apparently, one of my husband's transactions done over a week ago had been credited back to his account and then deducted again causing us to bounce yet again. I plan to take my complaints beyond this site.

MAINE -- I have been doing business with Key since 1993, and generally have had a small balance on my account (under $1k usually) because that we are one of many struggling small families. In this last week Key has broken the final straw. It began with a posting of an unnamed "service charge" of $10.00 when we were in particularly tight financial waters. When asked what the fee was, we were told it was to hold on to our bank statement, which could not be delivered. Interesting point since last months got here fine and we haven't moved.

However, that $10 dropped the account into the negative, and service charges became the name of the game; seven of them to be exact. When I learned our account was negative I put $100 in the account. By then (next day) they had charged me an additional $94.50 in overdraft charges. That put us to $-.33, which created another overdraft charge. So the next day I have to borrow $200 to bring the account back up. The balance showed well over $100 available so I put $20 gas into my truck and got dinner.

The next morning what do I find? Three more overdraft charges, the reason? Key's computers showed the withdrawals ahead of the deposit so they said it was "fair" to charge another $94.50. Total of overdraft charges $220.50 in three days. When I asked about overdraft protection a month ago they told me I couldn't get it, and now I see why. Please folks, be careful of Key. They are no longer a friendly local bank, and they won't hesitate to fleece your meager savings to meet their quarterly profit goals, then lie to you with a straight face and tell you it's your fault.