This is kind of long so please bear with me.
Over the last few months, the bank I have had a checking account with for over 10 years has been taking money out of my account. I realize my records are not always perfect so when I would check out my account online and the banks records would show that I had $5, $10, or even $15 dollars less than I thought I had, I figured maybe I had made a mistake and forgotten to write something down.
Two months ago, I deposited two checks from customers. Later I noticed that they had subtracted $75 from my account. When I contacted them by phone, I found out that it was something to do with one of the checks. I didn't find out until two weeks later that they had lost the check. They claimed it was never in the envelope. They granted me a temporary credit of $75 until their investigation was over. I never added that $75 to the balance in my books - nor did I use the money - because I was fairly certain that it would be removed in a couple of weeks anyway.
When the investigation was finished, I received a letter saying that because I had never provided them with the items they requested (??? they never requested anything from me) that they were unable to complete the investigation, and the $75 dollar credit would be removed from my account. Two days later I noticed that $75 was gone from my account and the balance they showed now matched what I had in my book. I was a little concerned that there was nothing to indicate that money had been taken out - no explanation of any debit to my account or anything, but I figured it would show up in a day or to. Two days later the reversal of credit showed up on my account and another $75 dollars was removed from my account.
I called to straighten things out, but the people I talked to said that money is never taken out of an account without a debit being shown and that I was mistaken because there was only one $75 debit to my account. They refused to listen to me, and basically said that they were right, I was wrong and that was that.
I began to think I must have accidentally added the temporary credit somewhere down the line and decided to keep much better records. A few days later I noticed that $5 dollars was missing without any record of money being taken out of the account. Then the day before yesterday $20 disappeared and the balance they had listed from two days before was changed. But not having done a printout of the previous balances, I had no proof. The problem was that the missing $20 came right before my dmv renewal and a payment to one of my credit cards got to the bank. Now thanks to the bank ripping me off and the two overdraft fees, I am $100 in the hole. I only make $200 a month and my next grant check won't get her until next month so I am screwed.
I did a search on ripoffreport.com, and after sifting through many, many pages of complaints against this bank, I found several complaints just like mine - money mysteriously vanishing out of accounts.
I know I can't get my money back. I spent over two hours that day when the $20 vanished, talking on the phone to them and in person at the bank. They basically treat me like I am the one who made the mistake and am now trying to rip them off.
My only recourse is to change banks. The only other banks close enough for me to consider are Bank of America and Washington Mutual. I want to know if any of you have done business with either of these two banks and can give me any kind of recommendation on them. I don't want to get away from the bank I have now just to find I have jumped out of the fire and onto the surface of the sun.
