Consumer complaint received 2025-03-17 00:00:00
Product: Credit card — General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem when making payments — Problem during payment process
Company: WESTERN ALLIANCE BANCORPORATION
State: CA

Complaint narrative:
XXXX XXXX XXXX  a division of Western Alliance Bank, is the bank that processes payments for many Homeowners Associations ( HOA ) in the country.

The Bank processes payments via this portal : XXXX XXXX XXXX. Apartment/condo owners can make one-time payments or schedule recurring ones to pay their monthly dues.

Fees charged to facilitate these payments are properly disclosed. Fees vary depending on the method used.

Although the payment limits are not disclosed in conjunction with the fees, when one enters an amount of XXXX dollars in the Payment Amount box, a text in red discloses the accepted ranges underneath the box : Payment Amount must be between {$0.00} and {$20000.00} However, if a Debit Card payment for {$4900.00} is attempted, the Banks website provides this error : We are unable to process your card payment. A transaction number has been created and reflects a status of failure. Please try again Unfortunately, re-attempting does not resolve the issue. Eventually, I contacted the Bank. I was told that the payment limit for debit and credit cards is {$1000.00}. When I pointed out that the disclosed limit is {$20000.00}, they indicated that this applies to ACH payments only. Although the Online Payment Terms and Conditions do say this " Payment Limits The Bank in its sole discretion may apply Transaction limits to the Service without notice or liability to

Association or End User. Notwithstanding, Bank or Association may periodically adjust the maximum Transaction limits, with or without notice. '' nothing suggests that Cards have different limits from ACH. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that the limit of {$20000.00} would be applicable to all payment methods. I protested because the lower limit for Cards is not properly disclosed. XXXX XXXX XXXX instructed me to contact my Property Management Company, XXXX XXXX. After doing so to request that payment limits as the same regardless of payment method, the response XXXX XXXX provided is that XXXX XXXX XXXX cant make that change because it would increase the fees owners pay for all associations serviced by the Bank.

At this point, Im trapped between XXXX XXXX XXXX and XXXX XXXX. The latter is not a financial intuition and may not be bound by UDAAP regulations. However, XXXX XXXX XXXX  must protect consumers from Unfair, Deceptive or Abusive Acts or Practices. I formally report that XXXX XXXX XXXX fails to comply with the current regulation because of these two facts : 1. Payment limits by payment method are not properly disclosed 2. The payment limit of {$1000.00} for debit cards means that if an Owner wants to make a payment for {$20000.00}, they would pay the {$5.00} debit card fee 20 times for a total of {$100.00}. If the debit card limit were the same as ACH, that is {$20000.00}, the total fee paid would be only {$5.00}. This negatively impacts homeowners with larger units ( HOA fees are proportional to the square footage ), who tend to be families with children. In many cases, the current card payment limits end up being discriminatory against larger families.

Moreover, it is false to say that applying the limit of {$20000.00} to both ACH and Card payments will increase the fees paid by homeowners. When paying by credit card, the 3 % is linear, therefore the payment limit is irrelevant as the fee will be directly proportional to the amount paid regardless of the limit. When paying by debit card, as explained above, homeowners can pay up to 20 times higher fees, which is unacceptably abusive.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation