<p>I don’t really post on the Parents Forum, but I need some help</p>
<p>I’ve been really good with making sure I have enough money in my checking and savings account at Wells Fargo, but recently something happened. My sister and I have a joint account and she’s really frugal and never overspends, but she gets this email that about an overdraft fee. I never really used my debit card since I got my financial aid check and I always make sure to never go over my limit when I do. Now my sister is ****ed off and confused on how she getting almost of $100 in overdraft fees. </p>
<p>This isn’t the first time Wells Fargo screwed up my family’s account. A couple months of ago, my parent started to notice money was missing from their accounts. Both of them always let each other know when they buy things so finally they called Wells Fargo customer service. They kept beating around the bush until my parents went to an actual branch to figure out the problem. They later find out that one of the bankers they talked to hooked their account with this random stranger, and this person has been transferring money from my parents’ accounts to theirs. Now I think this happening again, but with both mine and my sister’s account. I read about the lawsuit with Wells Fargo and now I’m really scared about my money.</p>
<p>I live in the Bay Area and would like to know what are some trustworthy banks to keep my money? I’m going to remove all my money from Wells Fargo tomorrow and putting it another bank. Any advice or testimonials from other people in a similar situation will be appreciated. </p>
<p>Sorry for any grammar mistakes, I typed fast and I’m kind of stressed out right now.</p>
<p>Maybe find a small local community bank to do business with or a credit union. Big national banking chains are tough to do business with…no one locally seems to have enough authority to do anything to help. Open account just in your name and not jointly with anyone else. Don’t give your bank acct #'s or passwords to anyone else…don’t let anyone else carry your checkbook or debit card.</p>
<p>I would go to a branch tomorrow and figure out how the overdrafts happened. I would then open my own account either there or somewhere else. Not sure why you have the joint account but it’s just too much of a mess to deal with unless you are married and living in the same house :D. If the OD’s are the bank’s fault, they will refund that money to you.</p>
<p>As for where to go, if you go local, and use ATMs alot, check on fees for using other banks. </p>
<p>You can go to bank and get an up to date list of transactions. It’s the banks job correct the problem. But don’t close account yet. You can move your money, but leave enough
In account so wells Fargo has some place to put back fees or any missing money. Otherwise you could be waiting for a check.</p>
<p>I can go online and look at the transactions in my checking account. I can see every credit and debit, every check, every bill paid, every ATM withdrawal. If there was a transaction that I did not authorize I would spot it immediately. Can’t you simply review the transactions in your account (if not online, then at the branch) and determine how the account got overdrawn?</p>
<p>As far as the bank inadvertently linking your account to a stranger’s account, that would seem to me to be an extremely rare occurrence. If you can’t trust Wells Fargo Bank, then you can’t trust any bank in the U.S.</p>
<p>Sharing an account with your sister (do you live in the same house) sounds like a recipe for problems. Even if she is frugal as you describe, the only way you can track a joint checking account is if each of you reports transactions to the other, and you each keep a record of all transactions going in and out of the account. Sounds like a really bad idea to me (to share an account with your sister that receives your financial aid).</p>
<p>I agree with NJres about looking over your accounts, with your sister on-line. I have Wells Fargo and look at our accounts often on line. I have an alert setup if the balance goes under a certain amount.</p>
<p>Even if you trust your sister fully, if she had a judgement placed against her, you could get burned when YOUR money is garnished out of the joint account. Avoid bad surprises and get an individual account.</p>
<p>I looked at the all charges from both of our accounts, not once did we ever over-withdraw. Our checking accounts didn’t even match the checking account number that over-withdrew. I just had a joint account with her because I was like 12 or 13 years old and I didn’t know how to use my money, but I just always forgot to get an individual account.</p>
<p>Be aware that some banks sort transaction in an order like this against your account in a given night of posting:</p>
<ul>
<li>First they take out any fees (monthly checking fees, etc.)</li>
<li>Then they apply anything that REMOVES money from the account (checks, ATM transactions, transfers out online, etc.)</li>
<li>Then they add in any deposits you made</li>
</ul>
<p>If you dip below zero (or your minimum balance for fees) EVEN IN THE MIDDLE OF THAT PROCESS, some banks will smack you with fees.</p>
<p>Note that if the bank makes a mistake and “links you with a random stranger” (which is going to be a highly unusual occurance, if it ever actually happens at all), they will pay back any money transferred out by that person.</p>
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<p>Go into the branch and sit down with your banker. It sounds to me like you don’t even know what accounts you and your sister have between you. I will say that having a joint bank account with another person (sibling or whatever) is not a good idea if you can help it. Spouses might be able to keep track of each other’s expenditures, but it is usually just a recipe for ending up with overdrafts and fees. While you are there, get a separate account set up for yourself to divide your funds from your sister’s if you can (if you are old enough).</p>
<p>Also, balance your account every single month. Take your statement (online or paper, whatever you get) and balance it, either on paper or in something like Quicken. I think many, many young people do not do this monthly activity. They just check their balance online, and assume it all is good if there is enough in the account to cover whatever they are about to pay. If you don’t balance your account every month, you run the risk of never noticing if something unusual is going on, or if the bank makes a mistake, as does happen occasionally.</p>
<p>You really don’t need to find another bank. You need to understand your own accounts and track the activity each month more carefully, and contact the bank immediately if there is an issue.</p>
<p>I agree with the other posters - check your transactions again online, see if you can find anything suspicious, especially the one that caused your balance to go negative. Print our your transactions and take the paper to your local branch. You can also ask them nicely to reverse the overdraft fee(s).</p>
<p>I have a Wells Fargo account that was overdrawn once, due to a check not clearing when the teller told me it would. They reversed the overdraft charge.</p>
<p>Our Wells branch is actually really good about this kind of stuff (and I have accounts at four different banks, some larger and a couple of smaller ones). The Wells branch in our area has the most staff, and I never have to wait a long time to talk to someone if I have a question or need something.</p>
<p>Is the email about your account, or is it some kind of phishing scam? Go to your branch and sort this out. If the email was not legitimate, they need to know.</p>
<p>Most if our money is in credit unions. Check the credit unions in your city to find out which ones you can join. Many participate in nationwide teller and joint branch networks that can allow even a small local CU to have tellers and “branches” all over the country.</p>
<p>I used to bank with Wells Fargo; I now do most of my business with a federal credit union. I ended up with Wells Fargo after about 3 mergers from my original bank over past few years. Wells Fargo has few branches in my town; it cut staff in branches I visited to bone; bank policies, fees and offered accounts were always changing; the door never seemed to stop revolving with branch manager changes; and waits for most any service in the Wells Fargo bank became intolerable. Everytime I tried to get someone in the local bank branch on the phone it seems I ended up on a cross country voice mail excursion. I gave them a chance, but I gave up on Wells Fargo. Wells Fargo I’m sure meets the financial needs of some people…they didn’t meet my expectations. My credit union is a better match for me.</p>
<p>Concur with getting individual accounts, which reduce the risk of error causing an overdraft, and which make it easier to reconcile and monitor the account and deal with bank errors.</p>
<p>In the mean time, you and she should check the account together, then go to the bank together to get them to fix whatever error they made.</p>
<p>OP, do the overdraft fees actually show up in your online account, or only in the email? If the latter, it’s a phishing attempt. I’ve received phishing emails purporting to come from Wells Fargo (easy to spot, since I don’t even have an account there).</p>
<p>I agree. I used to bank at B of A, another ginormous bank, and in more than 20 years, I never got an email from them. All communications initiated by the bank came in the mail.</p>
<p>OP, tell your sister not to respond to the email or click any links.</p>
<p>i highly doubt wells fargo took money from your account.<br>
if you suspect any unauthorized activity, go to any WFB and file a claim. You are protected from fraudulent transactions. (i used to work for WFB many years ago during college.) </p>
<p>transferring your money else where will not help you. you need to be more organized. Balance and reconcile your bank statements monthly.</p>
<p>^^It is possible that funds were taken out of their account by mistake. We had this happen to us about 15 years ago, someone’s savings account somehow got linked to our accounts. We got both deposits and withdrawals from that account into our account. If I remember correctly there was a transposed number in the system or something. Once we brought it to their attention, it was taken care of and we have not had an issue since.</p>
<p>Banks aren’t perfect. My checking account got jumbled up two times when a chiroquacker in the next town who has a name very similar to my name had his checking account get mingled by bank with my account. One time he got a bad check from one of his victims for around $1000 and the bank some how took money out of my account to cover the bad check the chiropractor with similar name got from his patient. Another time the accounts got mixed up too. I switched banks after all my checks bounced because of mix ups by the bank.</p>
<p>Wells Fargo has two ways to deliver message: regular mail and electronic mail. An account holder can elect how the messages are delivered (there is an option for both). If the electronic message is legitimate, it can be found on-line in the mailbox of account holder, once he or she logs in. </p>
<p>To me it definitely sounds like someone is trying to scam an OP. I would verify everything with the bank first and I would definitely not click on any links in the email or open any attachments.</p>