What is up with my bank?My bank, Farmers Citizens Bank in Bucyrus, OH is driving me nuts! My Social Security check is deposited on the third. My rent is due on the 4th. I can only pay my rent by money order. It can take up to 3 days to get access to my money by my debit card. When I call them they say it should be accessible by midnight... |
Not to shoot you down but your last statement is the exact problem. They don't know that the money is good. Social security checks (or any kind of check for that matter) can both be fraudulently created/deposited, and for that matter can even stil be cancelled. t's not lack of faith behind the U.S. government. After all if you deposit say a couple thousand dollars in paper cash it will be available to you the very moment you deposit it. Check forgery though costs financial institutions worldwide billions of dollars. Some people are pretty damn good at it. Every bank you ever go to will have a hold on any and all kinds of checks even cashiers checks. Sometimes these holds are waved if your account has a high enough balance. The banks are just protecting themselves and by that act their customers even if it does seem at the moment they are hurting you as the individual. None of these policies are uncommon or secret though. In fact the reason you have to pay rent by money order is so that your landlord can avoid the whole problem about the validity of funds.
Furthermore, even though we think of our money as being ours and in our head e think we deserve acces to it at any moment for any reason, that really isn't the case. When we deposit our money with a bank we sign a contract and that contract gives us perks (such as interest rates, free checking, the ability to write checks at all or use a debit card, or perhaps just the perk of having yoru money safely secured behind a vault door rather than under our pillow). With these perks come drawbacks. To pay for all of these perks the banks use our money to lend out to other people for interest so as to make money that they pass on to us in the form of the benifits we recieve. (after all someone had to pay for that teller that was helping you or the atm you put your money in). Because of this at any given moment a bank does not have a cash on hand supply equal to the total number of deposists listed at teh bank (in fact not even close). If you had a hundred thousand dollar account in good standing at a small town bank you would not be able to walk down close your account and ask for a hundred grand cash. It's yours of course and they would give it to you but frankly they either wouldnt have that much money or if they did it would keep them from giving out smaller denominations that day to others. So they would make you wait a certain number of days for the funds to be transferred.
It's just the way it is. And honestly it's not an unfair system if you take a look at it. it can just feel unfair when it doesn't roll our way at the moment. The best solution to yoru problem is build up a small surplus so that you are not dependant on a particular check clearing in order to pay a bill.
Your bank does not control when your SS check is deposited or when your rent is due. It's your responsbility to manage your money so that you can pay your rent on time.
most banks are the same way. so what i suggest, get in touch with your landlord and work out a schedule that you can pay your rent on the 6th or 7th, every month. that way you won't have to worry.
All banks are about to fail; the government has no money left. Buy gold and limited-edition baseball cards to secure your investments!
yes, I have bank of america. my paycheck comes in every midnight thursday. my account only have 10$ my car payment comes in the same as my paycheck but still charge me over draft fee. WTF!!!
