Bank of America Overdraft Fee Class Action Settlement

Time for another class-action lawsuit. This time, Bank of America and its affiliated banks are putting up $35 million to settle accusations of doing various naughty things to boost their revenues in the form of overdraft fees (AKA insufficient funds fees, bounced check fees, returned item fees).

For example, let’s say you have a bank balance of $500. You have debit card transactions of $15, $75, $200, and then $600. Allegedly, BofA would order the transactions posted from high-to-low, so that you’d have 4 separate overdraft fee charges, instead of just one.

According to the official settlement website, it looks like it may cover a lot of people. If you are eligible, you may be rewarded up to $78 depending on the number of claimants. You must submit a claim form either by mail or online by May 1, 2009. So who’s eligible?

You are a member of the Settlement Class and eligible for a payment if you resided in the United States at any time between the dates set forth below, had an account at a bank listed below, and meet all three of the following requirements:

1. Your account was accessible through a debit card, check card, or any other bank
   card used for debit purchases; AND
2. You paid at least one:
   1. insufficient funds fee, overdraft fee, returned item fee, or similar fee that was assessed to your account within five business days after a Bank of America debit card transaction either occurred or posted to your account; OR
   2. overlimit fee or similar fee that was assessed for an account cycle in which a Bank of America debit card transaction either occurred or posted to your account;
      AND
3. The insufficient funds fee, overdraft fee, returned item fee, overlimit fee, or similar fee was paid between the following dates:

For customers of . . .	From	Through
Bank of America	12/6/2000	12/31/2007
Fleet Bank, N.A.	4/1/2004	12/31/2007
U.S. Trust Company, N.A.	7/1/2007	12/31/2007
LaSalle Bank N.A. and LaSalle Bank Midwest N.A.	10/1/2007	12/31/2007

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