I am very frustrated at how, in the middle of such a horrible economy, a banking institution can continue to use such lude if not criminal tactics to steal money from the American public.

My husband lost his job about six months ago and we have been struggling every since. He had the only income in our home and both of us are looking for employment now to no avail. We have 4 children and our share of bills to take care of. Every penny we have has to be accounted for. Yet, this bank in the past few months has managed to steal at least $2000 from our account- claiming that it is NSF charges, which they can not tell me how these NSF charges came to be.

Everytime I call the lady I speak with can only go around in circles and never fully answer my questions. When I asked if she had a supervisor that I could speak to, she informed me that her supervisor did not handle such issues. I want to know if there is anything that I can do to get my money back. This is ridiculous and horrifying that a company can steal from people and not be held accountable. This is just the last issue I had with the bank. As you can see we went from having a positive balance to almost $300 in NSF charges, though noone could tell me how this happened.

I keep a tight checking account. I made a deposit after the cut off time of 4pm through the wachovia atm at the branch. After making the deposit, the available credit rises the first $100.00 of the deposit. So in other words if you have $100.00 already in the bank, you make a deposit of $500.00 through the atm; just after the deposit you check your balance; the available amount of funds increases to $200.00.

After which, if you use your debit or make a check card purchase and the transaction goes over the $100.00, but less than $200.00, they send the transaction in overdraft and charge a fee. If you just get cash out of the atm less than $200.00 there is no overdraft charge.

When a debit is made, the internet shows the posting date as the next day, not the day of the transaction, yet they still put the account in overdraft. Check card purchase are just put on hold and the posting date is not available.

How can this be legal. If they are not going to allow the funds to be used they need not to allow them to be available or have some statement showing that the funds available are only available through the atm, maybe on the receipt. This seems like a bait and switch type thing, where they make the funds appear to be available, but when the customer tries to use them, other at the atm, they send the transaction to overdraft, they don't decline the transaction, they just charge the $22 or whatever overdraft fee. This caused two transactions of mine to go into overdraft, when I called and asked for the refund of fee, they agreed to give half back, but this is not good enough. But for now, I have not been able to get the other half of the fees.

No telling how many customers are having the same issue and are being charge fees like this. I am not sure how this can be legal because it seems to be deceptive.

I am a sales associate at a sewing machine business and recently had a gentleman come into the store looking at machines. His home address was about 100 miles away and I know there are several sewing machine dealers located between our 2 locations. First red flag -

Long story short
He chose a sewing/embroidery machine for his daughter valued at 2800. He immediately pulled out a checkbook to make his purchase. I noticed immediately that the pre-printed address on the check was all in lower case letters. No capitalization of proper nouns! I found this very unusual.
Then I noticed when checking his license (which ended up not really being a license) that his last name was spelled differently by one letter. He didn't seem to be aware of this. Anyway, Wachovia Bank was listed on the check with the phone number 1-800-wachovia. So I called, and 3 times I was shifted to an automated system. I couldn't get any help from any live person. And it was awkward because the customer was standing across the counter from me the whole time. If this was a scam he really played it cool.
I ended up calling another store employee because I wanted the customer to be aware that I had someone else on the phone... I told him that it was our policy not to take any out of town checks without at least 2 forms of ID, which he didn't have. I told him I would hold the machine for him and he said he'd return in a few days. Obviously, he never returned.

I think Wachovia should be aware of this and yet when I called a 4th time after he left, and insisted on speaking to a real person, she didn't seem at all concerned and wasn't really interested.
hmmmm

On 08/15/08 I had a Garnishment posted to my account for $283.02 for my truck taxes. Wachovia then in turn charged me a $ 100.00 for legal fees. I did not even receive notice that a garnishment would be taken place until after funds were taken from my account. I went into my local branch in Garner, NC. to express my disconcern with the manager and demanded $100.00 be refunded to my account.

I was told that a member of the legal department would contact me to discuss the matter. I explained to the Manager that I have several check holds and automatic debits that will be coming out of my account and since they took this money with out my knowledge that it will more than likely cause them to bounce.

On 08/19/08, I checked my online banking and sure enough everything bounced and I was hit with $210.00 in overdraft fees. When I called and spoke with a representative for Wachovia. I was told that all they could refund me 'as a courtesy ' is $42.00. Which I feel is a slap in the face since they already took almost $300.00 from me. And left my account in the negative.

I told the representative that was not good enough and that I would be going into the branch to again discuss this matter with the manager. I was basically told if I entered the bank and caused a scene that they would immediately close my account. I have had more than my fair share of problems with Wachovia and am very upset on how there customer service department handled the situation. I believe this should be posted as a warning for anyone wanting to do business with this company. And I hope that this does not happen to anyone else.

My Husband and I have since stopped all are direct deposits for are payroll and have changed banks. As of 08/26/08 I still have not heard anything from the legal dept with Wachovia . I also have filed a report with the Better Business Bureau. Wachovia has stolen over $1000 from me in the last year for ridiculous NSF fees and Overdraft fees. And it stops now!! PLEASE TAKE THIS WARNING SERIOUSLY DO NOT BANK WITH THESE PEOPLE THEY WILL STEAL YOUR MONEY!!!

I too was ripped off by Wachovia bank. I had the same problems as everyone else with the overdraft fees. It gotten so bad with wachovia for a month I received none of my paychecks and they kept saying the merchants was holding my money and sending it thru when I have subtracted the monies from my account. At this time I still owe wachovia overdraft fees and have been fighting with them to refund me over 1200 of my money but they stated I was a new customer and they will not refund me my money even though it was there error. Please don't bank at wachovia they will rip you off royally.