Consumer complaint received 2018-11-09
Product: Checking or savings account — Checking account
Issue: Problem caused by your funds being low — Overdrafts and overdraft fees
Company: PNC Bank N.A. (DE)

This all started on XX/XX/XXXX I woke up and my PNC Bank account was negative 110.00 due to my car payment. I used money they had left and even had to borrow money to take my account out the negative so I wouldn't be charged an overdraft fee I couldn't afford. The last time I checked my account was XXXX that day just to make sure everything was fine and it was. Next day I get an alert saying my account has been overdrawn and I'm initially confused because I haven't used my card for anything since Saturday and everything processed on Monday so what else could it be. I see I had a negative charge of about XXXX dollars which wouldn't have been a problem cause I would have just added XXXX to my account to bring it back positive again yet I was charged a XXXX overdraft fee on top of the XXXX that I went out my way to avoid the previous day. When I called PNC bank that morning I spoke with a representative that told me the XXXX comes from my car payment but that didn't make any sense because my {$430.00} car payment was processed on Monday which caused my account to be -110 why wasn't the extra XXXX just charged on Monday making my account XXXX and I could have deposited XXXX or more on Monday XXXX instead of -110. So I explain that to the rep and I also explain that I just took my account out the negative the previous day buy depositing money and when I checked my account after work at XXXX my account was fine so what happened overnight that made me negative and charged a fee. At worse I should have been charged XXXX and given a chance to add money to bring my account out the negative but instead I was charged an overdraft fee right away after going to bed thinking my account was fine. The rep seemed to agree and did more research on it and even had to put me on hold for about 10 minutes because even he was confused. When he came back he kept inferring that it was a charge from Monday which I kept explaining why it made no sense from my standpoint and he then later tried to refund the overdraft fee for me but it was declined. He then told me he would have the manager from the overdraft department call later that day of XXXX or tomorrow XXXX. The manager did end up calling me on XXXX early in the afternoon and I explained to the same situation I explained to representative before her who was also way more helpful and she just seemed disinterested. I explained that I took all precautions to make sure my account wasn't negative to avoid a fee and how I'm not able to afford a overdraft fee. She gave me the run around and tried to justify the overdraft fee even after I explained how it didn't make sense and was bogus/unfair, she still didn't take anything I was saying into consideration but instead suggested I keep money in my savings account or apply for a credit card through PNC. At this point I got frustrated and couldn't understand why she make this big of a deal about XXXX dollars and refund me the fee and I just pay the XXXX dollars I needed to pay especially when I made a legitimate case that made way more sense than me being charged an overdraft fee for something that I guess was just partially processed on Monday and made my account negative overnight on Tuesday giving me no chance to fix that before I work up early Tuesday morning at XXXX with a {$36.00} fee. I mentioned I would fight this because PNC does have a recent history of being sued for overdraft fees like this and have 2 recent class action lawsuits against them for this very reason. My mother who also banks with PNC has gotten payouts over 1000 dollars twice due to joining the lawsuit. I have had a fight with PNC is the past just about a year and a half ago and refunded me over 100 dollars in fees. What transpired with me is shady and just down right ridiculous especially when you can see the deposits I made in my transactions to bring account positive. You can see I didn't just let my account go and made an effort and did bring my account back to a positive status until whatever happened Tuesday night/morning. PNC didn't even give me a minute to bring my account out the negative before charging me with a fee. Calls are recorded so if they need to relisten or anything they can cause everything I'm saying is legit and makes no sense you would want to irritate a customer over {$36.00}. I have friends who bank with other banks and work in banking and they never have to go though this to get a fee waived especially when they have a legitimate reason.