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Bank of America has lost Zelle transfers for many customers

275 points by ndiddy 4y ago

autotune 4y ago
While I noticed this issue this morning as well, it seems it has been credited back as of this afternoon.
sidcool 4y ago
What are Zelle transfer?
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  Instant, no-fee, irreversible transfer between participating US bank accounts. (Like most of the rest of the world has had for a decade or more, but it's new, and because it's new and there's very little education to consumers from the banks it's heavily used in scams. It also has a pretty confusing UX that lends itself to scams.)
  - alistairSH 4y ago
    It’s also a owned by the 5-6 largest consumer banks in the US (BofA, CapOne, etc). So, they’re complicit in allowing the fraud to continue.
    - fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
      What should the banks do to prevent scams?
      - timerol 4y ago
        Allow reversing transactions that are proven to be scams, as they are required by law to do. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/regulation-e.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/regulation-e.asp
        snotrockets 4y ago
        They can not disallow doing that (as you wrote, they are required to), but they do make it very hard, because they are unwilling to put up the cost. However, the regulator mandates they should: what needs to be done is make sure they are always taken to task, and that the task is extremely easy to perform.
      - ceejayoz 4y ago
        Ditch the patchwork nature of it, for starters. See the Zelle "getting started" page at https://www.zellepay.com/get-started https://www.zellepay.com/get-started - there's no solid set of instructions because there's almost two thousand different implementations of it. Your bank's procedure may be entirely different than mine's; if your bank doesn't support it it's a different procedure alltogether. As a result, scammers can fairly easily convince someone who's never or infrequently used it that their process (usually with a phished website posing as Zelle) is legit. The "it's a banking technology, but it's also a website and an app, maybe, it depends" thing doesn't help.
        thrwy_918 4y ago
        Zelle is also built around the idea that each identity will be connected to exactly one bank account, which is very irritating.
        krferriter 4y ago
        It was pretty wild when I logged into one of my other bank accounts and it said I could not use Zelle with that account because I already had Zelle linked to a different bank account. So I had to unlink it from the other account first. Isn't it common for people to have more than one bank account, and wasn't this the case when Zelle was developed, relatively recently? Why did this use case not cross their mind when they developed it?
        alistairSH 4y ago
        LOL. That's insane. Is it one Zelle link, period? Or only to one bank (but you could link several accounts from that one back)?
        thrwy_918 4y ago
        >Is it one Zelle link, period? I believe a single Zelle identity can only be linked to a single bank account, and a Zelle identity consists of an email address, phone number or both. Typically it's the "both" option, but I think that in theory you could create multiple identities with multiple email addresses, and link each to a separate bank account
      - jabroni_salad 4y ago
        You can never really prevent scams, it is what it is. However, they need to keep a paper trail and reverse bad transactions. If someone impersonates me or steals my debit card, they can do a bad ATM withdrawal and get cash. That can be reversed, but for some reason once Zelle is in the picture everything is written in stone.
        sowbug 4y ago
        Just to be clear, Zelle's irrevocability doesn't legitimize criminal acts or fraud. It just means your bank won't help you untangle the mess. It's rare that a lawsuit against a fraudster or thief goes anywhere, but depending on the amount lost, it can be worth it to obtain a default judgment, which can typically be collected for 10 years. If you can identify the person or entity that took your money, they might eventually have enough assets for you to collect.
    - raincom 4y ago
      Use Zelle to transfer to the people you know--that's the intended purpose of Zelle. If you are buying a service/product, use credit cards or PayPal.
      - snotrockets 4y ago
        Or remind the banks that regulation E puts the responsibility of fraud (minus $50) on them. US banks got scared by money transfer apps, and decided they want to provide a similar service, at no cost to customers, and minimal cost to them. Of course, they can't have it all, and now they try to put some costs they are not allowed to, onto their customers.
    - riffic 4y ago
      lol, bofa.
  - bityard 4y ago
    Instant and no-fee I can get behind but irreversible sounds like an awesome way to lose a lot of money.
    - notch656c 4y ago
      Reversibility means risk incurred on the transfer system which means not free. Reversibility to the people you pay also means you pay a premium as the vendor has to self or externally insure the risk the funds will be recalled.
    - wintermutestwin 4y ago
      I've seen it IRL. Zelle claims no responsibility and that they can't track what they sent.
      - salawat 4y ago
        Fines for failure to implement legally mandated Anti-Money Laundering measures in 3...2...1... Seriously. If they can't, it will not be long until the omission is noticed.
    - plsbenice34 4y ago
      I only ever worry of the opposite: reversibility leading to chargeback scams.
  - jesprenj 4y ago
    > most of the rest of the world has had for a decade or more What specific system are you implying? In Slovenia, I can't make a bank transfer online when my bank is closed (at night). Money transfer between banks costs me 40 cents per transaction and international transfer in the EU costs me around 7 €. Maestro card is instant and free and works even when the bank is closed, but it is only used for spending money. I don't pay any fees for my bank account, since I'm younger than 27.
    - watermelon0 4y ago
      EU countries (and a few others) are part of SEPA, where we have SEPA Instant Payments, which offer instant payments between bank accounts, 24/7. Price depends on the bank (and the type of bank account you have), but it's about 1 EUR or less. --- Many countries also have local payment systems, that are usually limited to a single country. For example, in Slovenia, we have Flik Pay, which allows sending money between individuals via mobile app, without any fees, and it also works 24/7.
      - jesprenj 4y ago
        I see - probably the Nujno (urgent) checkbox on a SEPA form activates this SEPA instant payment. I know about Flik and I like the appeal of it, but I do not use it because it requires a proprietary client (NLB Pay in my case). Do you know of any public or reverse engineered specification or unofficial FOSS client?
    - newaccount74 4y ago
      > international transfer in the EU costs me around 7 € Are you sure about that? I thought with SEPA all Euro transfers within the EU have to be the same fee as national transfers, which is free for almost all consumer bank accounts in Austria. My bank charges for instant transfers on my business account (around 8€), but other than that all transfers are free.
      - jesprenj 4y ago
        You are right, I verified this now. EU payments cost me the same amount as domestic payments. The ~7 € charge I remember was probably due to conversion. I wanted to send money to Croatia, which at the time did not use Euro yet.
  - baby 4y ago
    It’s also limited to 2k a day
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      The limit is up to each participating bank.
      - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
        My bank varies the limit for me each day. Sometimes I can’t transfer $1000. Sometimes I can. Once I tried to transfer $3000 over many different days. No way. Can’t do it. Customer service says the limited cannot be raised past a certain point. And they won’t tell me what the limit is.
      - baby 4y ago
        Ah interesting, well with Chase it's $2k which is quite annoying
  - cle 4y ago
    > irreversible transfer Apparently they're not irreversible...
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      They're irreversible, except "unauthorized" transactions. Most scammers generate authorized transactions via trickery. Banks won't accept "I was tricked" as "unauthorized"; they only count cases of actual account compromise, and even there... https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/03/business/nightcap-zelle-fraud-warren-investigation/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/03/business/nightcap-zelle-fraud... > The bank data reviewed by Warren’s office suggest even the bulk of unauthorized cases are going unpaid. For example: PNC Bank indicated that its customers reported 10,683 cases of unauthorized payments totaling over $10.6 million. It refunded only 1,495 cases, totaling $1.46 million.
      - snotrockets 4y ago
        It doesn't matter what banks accept; they are required to by the regulator. That they try to weasel out of it just means they need to be regulated harder and at more cost to the executive suit.
        ceejayoz 4y ago
        > It doesn't matter what banks accept; they are required to by the regulator. Regulation E (https://www.consumerfinance.gov/rules-policy/regulations/1005/2/#j https://www.consumerfinance.gov/rules-policy/regulations/100...): "'Unauthorized electronic fund transfer' means an electronic fund transfer from a consumer's account initiated by a person other than the consumer without actual authority to initiate the transfer and from which the consumer receives no benefit." How is "I willingly initiated a transfer to someone who turned out to be a scammer" within this definition?
        snotrockets 4y ago
        Competent (non-software) professionals would read the initiation as the intent, also see comment 4 there, suggesting the mindset of the regulator. As a reminder, regulations are always subject to the interpereation of the regulator, which, as history shows in the case of regulation E, tends to side with the consumers. There's a deeper story here though: * Banks are given a monopoly to almost literally print money. We ceded control of a very important facet of daily lives to them. * The cost for that is tight regulation, meant to make sure they keep the trust invested in them. * In the case of Zelle, and some other new products, banks, rushing to market, try to ignore their side of the deal. * Suggesting we should give up and accept that is morally, regulatory, and legally wrong. * Regulators and policy makers seem to agree with the above.
  - imtringued 4y ago
    SEPA instant payments are pretty new but yeah even Europe has that now.
    - kergonath 4y ago
      Even before instant transfers, standard SEPA was quick and easy. The big step forward was when they let us add beneficiaries from a phone app or a website rather than by sending verification codes over snail mail, but that was a while ago now.
  - Semaphor 4y ago
    From everything I heard, the system in Germany/Europe is better than ACH, but instant interbank transfers are only a few years old, and usually are not feeless.
  - pxx 4y ago
    "Instant" is wrong. I've had successful Zelle transfers take upwards of 60 minutes to clear without any sort of confirmation of progress. It's a real pain.
  - snotrockets 4y ago
    It isn't irreversible. No bank transfer is.
barbazoo 4y ago
https://www.zellepay.com/ https://www.zellepay.com/ for those (like me) that don't know
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
gr4yb34rd 4y ago
praise that brave reddit moderator for rushing in there to lock down the thread and remove any content that might hurt BoA's feelings.
- steelframe 4y ago
  Amateur moderation is awful and often exploitative. I moderated a sub for about a year. At the time I felt like I was furthering a worthy cause. In retrospect I now feel like a schmuck who basically gave free labor to a company, making the platform more attractive to advertisers. I don't expect the hours I spent combing through troll posts had any measurable impact on the "cause" that sub was nominally furthering. In general I no longer contribute content to platforms that directly leverage my contributions to more effectively pull in advertising or subscription fees. After seeing first-hand how moderators I "worked" with operate, I also assume any moderated social media content is corrupted by the moderators' biases.
  - ethbr0 4y ago
    In order for moderations to be sustainable and high quality, you need a large number of people who are: (a) intelligent, (b) unbiased, (c) willing to volunteer their time without compensation, (d) happy if someone else makes a profit off their work, & (e) willing to do the job forever. There aren't many people like that. More typically, they don't understand (c) or (d) in the context of moderation, or (a) and/or (b) are lacking. And once they do understand (c) and (d), (e) evaporates.
  - oliwarner 4y ago
    That was a peculiar dig at community moderation. Twitter and Facebook repeatedly show how very wrong "professional" moderators get it. Almost like caring about a topic makes you better suited to maintain a community around it. The other side of the coin is that many communities wouldn't exist without Reddit, and many wouldn't be tolerated by Reddit without moderators. Many subs have been closed for inadequate moderation. So you see it as free work, I say you get what you give. You want a nice place to chat? Pony up. Cash or effort.
ctoth 4y ago
I have long been terrified of something shaped a bit like this. Here in the US we already treat most workers like absolute garbage. If one day the Average Joe wakes up and finds that all his money is merely some electronic scribbles in a database which have mysteriously gone missing, the social unrest is probably something that most people on this site couldn't even conceptualize of. Today it's Zelle, but what happens when you and everyone you know wake up and check your bank account and get an error. Suddenly can't buy food? So on. Sure, they keep backups. You hope. Do they test restoration? What would have to go wrong deep in the depths of a financial system creaking along on 1970s technology in order to really throw a wrench in things?
- tmpz22 4y ago
  Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Don't daily carry a physical debit card to your largest accounts that could be easily lost or stolen. Take advantage of credit card protections, or cash. Plopping your life savings in one large savings account has never been a good idea.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - astrange 4y ago
    > Plopping your life savings in one large savings account has never been a good idea. Yeah, it should be in a tax advantaged retirement account.
- notch656c 4y ago
  If you have enough money in the bank to buy groceries you have enough money to take out of the bank and put in your mattress for groceries. Also HN will probably get upset for me saying this but a few grams of gold or silver or other goods easily tradeable like whiskey or ammo never hurt anybody and might buy you a pig to slaughter or something.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
marstall 4y ago
Is this the kind of rumor that starts a "run on the bank"?
- eYrKEC2 4y ago
  How? The lender of last resort is the United State Government. Thank goodness the bankers will always be made whole.
  - marstall 4y ago
    everybody panicking and closing their accounts?
  - nostrebored 4y ago
    That doesn’t mean that a run can’t happen, just that it’s less bad than it was before real-time transfers from the fed. I imagine any such event would require a bank to massively divest which could trigger a market event as well
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > How? The lender of last resort is the United State Government. Lender of last resort makes runs less likely and lossy. It doesn’t prevent them altogether.
    - bobthepanda 4y ago
      Also, plenty of runs end in the FDIC resolving in a way that the parent bank no longer exists. Managed buyouts are preferred partially so that the government does not have to deal with the logistics of running a retail bank, but mostly because if a bank with sufficient funds takes over then there is no interruption to depositors’ access to funds.
      - jsmith45 4y ago
        The FDIC is required by law to use the plan for handling a failed bank that will cost the least to its fund. Buyouts offers that cover all insured funds are typically cheaper than directly paying out. Indeed, most commonly the buying bank will offer to take all the full balance of any insurable account, not just up to the insurance limit. The logic here seems to be that the extra from taking on those balances is usually pretty small, and it does save work on the FDIC's side as there would be fewer creditors. Thus it makes bids with that include full balances more attractive than those that don't, increasing the chance that the buyer's bid will be selected for final resolution. Of course, occasionally the winning bid is limited to just insured balances, and very occasionally, the cheapest option is for the FDIC to directly cut checks to handle the insurance side, and proceed as receiver in selling off any saleable assets and paying of creditors.
gnicholas 4y ago
When my older relatives wanted to send money to family/friends, I used to recommend Zelle, which was better than the never-heard-of-it apps they were considering. But with all the problems I keep hearing about Zelle, they're off the list. Most of them have iPhones and so I just tell them to send cash via Messages/Apple Cash. I don't know how reversible that sort of thing is, in the case of fraud, but as long as they can see the messaging history with the person before they send it, it seems like that's a pretty low risk. Any other suggestions for older adults?
- neon_electro 4y ago
  I no longer recommend Cash App (formerly Square Cash) because they explicitly removed the ability to have inbound transactions be automatically deposited into your bank account. They left it on for anyone who already had it on, but I specifically signed my dad up on the assumption that sending him money would be as frictionless as possible. Instead, Square/Block would love for that money to stay in the Cash App account, not actually available for him to spend in his own account. I continue to use Cash App because I continue to have this feature; if they ever remove it, I'm gone.
  - gnicholas 4y ago
    I got burned by the Cash app as well, with bait-and-switch tactics around their merchant discounts. Their system had problems registering merchants correctly, so the discounts pretty much never went through for me. I tried to get support but they didn't care. I bounced.
  - ezfe 4y ago
    I don't actually blame them for this, because they have to make money somehow. If they make money by having your money in your account for a few hours/days, idc. So long as they make it frictionless to start a withdrawal - a tap or two, that's all I ask.
    - neon_electro 4y ago
      I do blame them for this - they can get fucked. For my dad, Auto Cash Out was exactly the "frictionless" experience he needed, and he didn't need any of the BS Cash App wants to put in front of him. I'm happy to help Square/Block make money with my engagement/interaction with Cash App, but they clearly can't figure it out without severely harming the UX in the process. Therefore, they aren't recommended.
andrewflnr 4y ago
It's removed now. Does anyone remember enough to give the gist of what allegedly happened?
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  The stickied mod comment reproduces the post's contents. > If you bank with BoA check your balance this morning. Our account is negative due to thousands of dollars in Zelle transfers suddenly vanishing overnight. Calling customer service goes nowhere, just dead air. > Many other customers reporting the same problem: https://downdetector.com/status/bank-of-america/ https://downdetector.com/status/bank-of-america/
- thenews 4y ago
  https://www.unddit.com/ https://www.unddit.com/
elforce002 4y ago
Interesting. I don't agree with the concept of 'cashless' society. This is no paranoia, conspiracy theory. I don't know if this is the first time this happens but this is one to many times for most people. The healthy thing is to have multiple options ranging from cash, credit/debit cards, up to apps with NFC payments, etc... There has to be a limit on how much tech is too much. This goes for every human facet (medicine, law, etc). Sorry for ranting about it.
- sowbug 4y ago
  HN likes to trash Bitcoin, but at least you can understand where the pro-Bitcoin folks are coming from. If a cashless society is inevitable, would you prefer that all such transactions be mediated by a small number of large corporations? Or would you prefer the option of at least some of your transactions happening through a peer-to-peer system that no corporation or government controls?
  - 2OEH8eoCRo0 4y ago
    Bitcoin doesn't have an undo button. I know somebody who works cybercrime and they routinely get people their money back after being scammed. If they were scammed into using bitcoin that money is gone.
    - StanislavPetrov 4y ago
      Some of us would much rather take a tiny chance at being "scammed" than the certainty of being at the mercy of the government, the banks and the payment processors. In an ideal world, both of these choices would be available to adults to manage their risks and their own finances as they saw fit, rather than being forced into the latter system "for their own good".
- rocket_surgeron 4y ago
  Much less digital money is lost than real money. And when digital money is lost due to fraud or error it can be restored. For example, in 30 years of banking I have lost $0.00 in digital money. Sure, there have been gas station skimmers, system outages, misplaced debit cards, but I haven't "lost" a single cent. I have lost at least $20.00 in real physical money. $0.00 < $20.00 Digitalization helps other things too, I've lost hundreds of dollars in misplaced transit cards. Back in the 90s when I was a broke punk some loser stole a transit card with ~$47 on it. That was (and is) a big deal. Others have been misplaced or damaged beyond hope. Since digital transit cards became a thing I have lost $0.00 in transit funds.
ritonlajoie 4y ago
archive (kind of) https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/bank_of_america_just_lost_all_zelle_transfers_for/ https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/ba...
kaitrain87 4y ago
Does anyone have context of the content as the original post is gone from Reddit? Also on my BoA App, I have the notification: > Please Note: Zelle transactions made between and January 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay or inconvenience. Not to discount the stress that it induces, and our expectations as customers, but hopefully it's a blimp in their servers.
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  "Delayed" and "get undone, leaving negative balances" aren't the same, though. The first is annoying; the second is terrifying.
- steve_adams_86 4y ago
  First we got bugs in our servers, now we need to learn to deblimp them? This field evolves too quickly
  - elliottkember 4y ago
    ah yes, the "hindenbug"
- Animats 4y ago
  Correct text, copied from BoA web site: Please note: Zelle® transactions made between January 14 and January 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay or inconvenience. Phone support: "Due to extenuating circumstances, we are not able to take your call at this time."
- mikequinlan 4y ago
  https://www.reveddit.com/v/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/bank_of_america_just_lost_all_zelle_transfers_for/ https://www.reveddit.com/v/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/...
- 4y ago
DennisP 4y ago
One of the reddit comments says: > Zelle isn't problematic if you use it for its intended purpose and don't send money to complete strangers Why does it matter whether you're acquainted with the recipient?
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  > Why does it matter whether you're acquainted with the recipient? Because the transfers can't be canceled/reversed, so there's no recourse if the recipient is scamming you.
  - snotrockets 4y ago
    This isn't true. All bank transfers and reversible. Some easier then other, but none are no-recurse, regardless what a low tier customer service agent insists. It may require more effort, and maybe someone above their pay grade, but it is possible. And Zelle itself, like all electronic bank transfers in the US, is subject to regulation E, which puts the responsibility for unauthorized transfers on the banks (minus $50, a sum that most banks would waive). Zelle themselves mention regulation E on their website: https://www.zellepay.com/financial-education/pay-it-safe/understanding-fraud-scams https://www.zellepay.com/financial-education/pay-it-safe/und... Some institutions erroneously claim that regulation E only protects from hacks: that is, if the scam was offline: someone convinced you to send them money, and you did, and got scammed, then it doesn't fall under regulation E. However, it seems the regulators disagree, and banks and Zelle do fall in line once you sternly write to their compliance department and the regulator reminding them of that.
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      Sending money to a scammer tends to be an authorized transfer; you made it yourself, intentionally. The Zelle page you said itself states "Because you authorized the payment, you may not be able to get your money back." I would not hang my hat on a Regulation E complaint in this scenario.
      - 4y ago
hungryforcodes 4y ago
Ah and Bitcoin is so dangerous. We obviously need central banks to solve all it's terrible problems. /s
- BoorishBears 4y ago
  Well does Bitcoin have anyone with $50 billion dollars on hand and an additional $500 billion dollar line of credit with the US government to cover things like the FTX collapse?
raincom 4y ago
"Zelle transactions made between Jan 14 and Jan 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay and inconvenience" That's what Bank of America says on the mobile app. I sent a couple of Zelle payments on Jan 15 and Jan 17. They payment I sent on Jan 15 is missing on my side. EDIT: an hour later, BofA fixed my Zelle Jan 15 transaction.
riffic 4y ago
Bank of America is a consistently terrible company. They're like the financial LastPass - avoid if at all possible.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 4y ago
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Maursault 4y ago
Zelle is the choice of scammers. Incidentally, Zelle offers no guarantees or refunds. I don't know why anyone would use Zelle under those circumstances. Some banks will automagically sign their customers up for Zelle accounts, exposing them to scam risks for which there is no resolution. Money gone.
- dcist 4y ago
  Yup, this happened to me. I didn't sign up for Zelle. Didn't know I even had it. I lost $3,000 and BofA refused to reverse or refund any of the charges. Total BS.
  - crazygringo 4y ago
    But how? How did a scammer log into your account in order to set up a transfer?
- astrange 4y ago
  Whether or not they accept fraud claims isn't up to them, it's up to banking regulators. https://www.wsj.com/articles/jpmorgan-other-banks-in-talks-to-reimburse-scammed-zelle-customers-11669608886 https://www.wsj.com/articles/jpmorgan-other-banks-in-talks-t...
- noahtallen 4y ago
  IMO, the risk is pretty minimal. Zelle isn’t a 3rd party payment platform — it’s a feature/standard a bank implements to give you instant peer-to-peer bank transfers. Zelle the company is owned by the banks, including Bank of America. So this is just BoA adding a feature they partly created to their banking suite. That in itself isn’t a red flag. Zelle itself is also secure. You have to be fully logged into your bank account to use it! So it’s as secure as any banking service. The reason someone would use Zelle is p2p bank transfers between people you know. Like if your friend wrote you a check to cover their half of a hotel on a vacation. Just replace that with Zelle. It’s better than, say, Venmo because it goes directly between bank accounts immediately, without the intermediate third party and waiting 3 days for Venmo to give you your money. The only risk you’re exposed to is if you blindly send money to someone you don’t know, which you shouldn’t be doing on most platforms. (For example, you only really get buyer protection using goods and services type transfers on other payment apps, which have extra transaction fees.) I think the end line is that banks should have better fraud protection for bank accounts. Including debit cards, ACH, checks, and Zelle. I supposed my summary is that Zelle isn’t really unique. It’s just faster bank transfers
sschueller 4y ago
I don't understand why overdraft hasn't been outlawed. It's literally a tax on you if you make one tiny mistake or your bank make a mistake. If I dont have the money block the transaction and offer a line of credit with specific apr for those that want to be able to overdraft.
- eclipxe 4y ago
  That's fairly common, most banks have "overdraft protection" that works exactly how you described.
  - galleywest200 4y ago
    Correct. I called my bank and had them enable this for my debit card. They made sure to clarify that ACH transactions will still go through, however.
  - mullingitover 4y ago
    I've used a credit union my whole adult life and they did't offer overdraft as an option. That's because it was automatically enabled by default. This is what banks would do if they weren't predatory.
  - nomagicbullet 4y ago
    It is not exactly the same thing. The commenter you are responding to is looking to avoid overdraft, not having an insurance on overdraft. I'd agree with the idea of avoiding overdraft entirely unless a customer signs up for it. I don't want transactions I can't afford to go through. I manage my accounts quite closely. For me such situation would be 99% an unintended transaction that I would like to cancel. By letting such requests go through, banks put the burden on the customers to clean up after a wrong or, in many cases, illegal transaction. YMMV.
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      Overdrafting IS opt-in. I had a bank charge me an overdraft fee. I asked them to show me my overdraft authorization. It's amazing how fast a bank can return money when they screw up.
cs702 4y ago
From BofA's website: "Zelle: A safe and easy way to send and receive money fast!"[a] BofA forgot to add: "...unless your account goes into overdraft because we somehow lost your incoming Zelle transfer." Let's hope that BoFA does right by customers. -- [a] https://www.bankofamerica.com/online-banking/mobile-and-online-banking-features/send-receive-money/ https://www.bankofamerica.com/online-banking/mobile-and-onli...
- fnordpiglet 4y ago
  I will bet the do for the people who wade through customer support, but the vast majority of folks likely will just improve their profits by paying fees they shouldn’t have accumulated.
hnburnsy 4y ago
Always have checking\financial accounts at two different institutions. One of them can close your accounts or have delay accessing your money at any time and never have to give you a reason.
cypress66 4y ago
Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Have some physical cash, a couple of bank accounts, stocks and bonds, cryptocurrencies, valuable items if chaos ensues (guns, ammo, fuel, etc) and so on.
- helen___keller 4y ago
  I’m a big fan of your list because (other than fuel), each item you list is an order of magnitude less likely to be necessary or even useful Physical cash: very likely you need it some day soon Multiple bank accounts: technical issues, fraud, etc, plenty of reasons that might make one accounts funds unavailable Stocks: if there’s bank runs or such you can have equity to fall back on Crypto: if your entire economy goes kaput but the world economy lives on, this can be useful Guns, ammo: if civilization as we know it falls apart atleast you can shoot some people before starving to death
dcist 4y ago
I got scammed by a Zelle transfer when someone used my phone (without my authorization). I didn't even know I had Zelle but it's built into the BofA app. I lost $3,000. BofA refused to refund any of the transfer or reverse it. Total trash feature. I didn't sign up for it. I don't want it. BofA signed me up for it. I'm changing banks because of it.
- amluto 4y ago
  The magic words are “Reg E”. Your bank won’t tell you about it, but they must follow the regulation.
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
    https://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/supmanual/cch/efta.pdf https://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/supmanual/cch/efta.... I'm not familiar with this and therefore not sure if this is the correct source but I tried to find something official.
- pavlov 4y ago
  How did they get access to the bank app on your phone?
  - humanistbot 4y ago
    If you close the BofA app after you are done, you have to log in again with either password or biometrics. If you don't and just go to the home screen, it stays logged in.
    - tinsmith 4y ago
      This seems like a remarkable oversite on BofA's part. I'm with a comparitively tiny US credit union, and even their app demands a pin code to return to it if I switch to another app mid-session.
    - pavlov 4y ago
      In that case I’d argue the issue here is terrible security in BofA’s mobile app, not the kind of money transfer.
RektBoy 4y ago
Why don't Americans use direct money transfer from one bank account to another, like rest of the world? I lol everytime I see these problems.
- IAmGraydon 4y ago
  We do (ACH), but it takes 3-5 business days to complete.
  - astrange 4y ago
    ACH never "completes", there's no confirmation in the system. The bank merely decided 3 days is enough time to assume there isn't a reversal coming, but some reversal reasons can be expected to take up to 60 days. Some banks have been offering "two days early payroll"; that just means they see enough transactions for your paycheck that they've decided to just trust it.
- refurb 4y ago
  Pretty sure a bank IT problem is going to affect direct money transfers too?
the-anarchist 4y ago
Ah, perfect, just in time for the DoJ announcing they're going after cryptographically sound and undisputable transfers of value.
whartung 4y ago
I guess I'll be the lone voice in the wilderness. We've been perfectly happy with Zelle. We use it a couple times a month to pay service providers, send money to family. Never had any issues with it, don't need an "app" for it, works with our normal bank stuff. Similarly, at the same time, we got a check recently from a settlement. We plonked it into our account, and it bounced. It was a large settlement (i.e. lots of people), and the law firm in charge of writing the checks messed up, and thus canceled all of checks and re-issued them a couple weeks later. It was a big deal. Stuff happens. Hopefully BofA owns up and refunds all of the overdraft problems, but they can't roll it all back. Bouncing checks have repercussions out of the banks control (landlords tend to frown on bounced checks, for example), which behooves them to be more diligent about things like this that can impact that. The big problem is that people are out of the loop for things like this. Computer pulls the money back, computer bounces the check, computer notes the bounced check, computer tells the other computer you bounced a check, computer craters your credit rating. There are no "people" involved in this, it's all procedures and rules and such encoding is the "logic" of one of the most inscrutable creations man has ever created -- the computer. And people have to scurry about to compensate for the vast ripple effects these things can have that impact peoples lives. So, hopefully BofA cleans up their end, but more importantly, hopefully everyone down stream is patient with those affected and helps them recover as well. And, finally, no doubt a legion of scammers will crawl out of the wood work leveraging this event to gain some advantage. Way of the world.
- MuffinFlavored 4y ago
  > pay service providers, send money to family how does the recipient of a zelle transaction know if it’s tax worthy (aka needs to go on 1099) or just sending money to family? i don’t see a way to “tag”/“flag” transactions same goes for cashapp
  - the_reformation 4y ago
    this is a feature, not a bug
    - 4y ago
nunez 4y ago
unddit: https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/bank_of_america_just_lost_all_zelle_transfers_for/ https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/ba...
tiffanyh 4y ago
I wonder why this only effects BofA, given that Zelle is run by EWS and many banks use the service.
dbg31415 4y ago
I hate how hard it is to do bank transfers in the US. When I was in Sydney, you just added someone's BSB and account numbers, and you could add their phone number and most apps would know how to translate that... and you could Vemno / Zelle without the app. Dirt simple. No clue why it has to be complicated in the US. Just seems moronic.
sys_64738 4y ago
BofA is a terrible bank. Safer to use a mattress.

275 points by ndiddy 4y ago

autotune 4y ago

While I noticed this issue this morning as well, it seems it has been credited back as of this afternoon.

sidcool 4y ago

What are Zelle transfer?

ceejayoz 4y ago
Instant, no-fee, irreversible transfer between participating US bank accounts. (Like most of the rest of the world has had for a decade or more, but it's new, and because it's new and there's very little education to consumers from the banks it's heavily used in scams. It also has a pretty confusing UX that lends itself to scams.)
- alistairSH 4y ago
  It’s also a owned by the 5-6 largest consumer banks in the US (BofA, CapOne, etc). So, they’re complicit in allowing the fraud to continue.
  - fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
    What should the banks do to prevent scams?
    - timerol 4y ago
      Allow reversing transactions that are proven to be scams, as they are required by law to do. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/regulation-e.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/regulation-e.asp
      - snotrockets 4y ago
        They can not disallow doing that (as you wrote, they are required to), but they do make it very hard, because they are unwilling to put up the cost. However, the regulator mandates they should: what needs to be done is make sure they are always taken to task, and that the task is extremely easy to perform.
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      Ditch the patchwork nature of it, for starters. See the Zelle "getting started" page at https://www.zellepay.com/get-started https://www.zellepay.com/get-started - there's no solid set of instructions because there's almost two thousand different implementations of it. Your bank's procedure may be entirely different than mine's; if your bank doesn't support it it's a different procedure alltogether. As a result, scammers can fairly easily convince someone who's never or infrequently used it that their process (usually with a phished website posing as Zelle) is legit. The "it's a banking technology, but it's also a website and an app, maybe, it depends" thing doesn't help.
      - thrwy_918 4y ago
        Zelle is also built around the idea that each identity will be connected to exactly one bank account, which is very irritating.
        krferriter 4y ago
        It was pretty wild when I logged into one of my other bank accounts and it said I could not use Zelle with that account because I already had Zelle linked to a different bank account. So I had to unlink it from the other account first. Isn't it common for people to have more than one bank account, and wasn't this the case when Zelle was developed, relatively recently? Why did this use case not cross their mind when they developed it?
        alistairSH 4y ago
        LOL. That's insane. Is it one Zelle link, period? Or only to one bank (but you could link several accounts from that one back)?
        thrwy_918 4y ago
        >Is it one Zelle link, period? I believe a single Zelle identity can only be linked to a single bank account, and a Zelle identity consists of an email address, phone number or both. Typically it's the "both" option, but I think that in theory you could create multiple identities with multiple email addresses, and link each to a separate bank account
    - jabroni_salad 4y ago
      You can never really prevent scams, it is what it is. However, they need to keep a paper trail and reverse bad transactions. If someone impersonates me or steals my debit card, they can do a bad ATM withdrawal and get cash. That can be reversed, but for some reason once Zelle is in the picture everything is written in stone.
      - sowbug 4y ago
        Just to be clear, Zelle's irrevocability doesn't legitimize criminal acts or fraud. It just means your bank won't help you untangle the mess. It's rare that a lawsuit against a fraudster or thief goes anywhere, but depending on the amount lost, it can be worth it to obtain a default judgment, which can typically be collected for 10 years. If you can identify the person or entity that took your money, they might eventually have enough assets for you to collect.
  - raincom 4y ago
    Use Zelle to transfer to the people you know--that's the intended purpose of Zelle. If you are buying a service/product, use credit cards or PayPal.
    - snotrockets 4y ago
      Or remind the banks that regulation E puts the responsibility of fraud (minus $50) on them. US banks got scared by money transfer apps, and decided they want to provide a similar service, at no cost to customers, and minimal cost to them. Of course, they can't have it all, and now they try to put some costs they are not allowed to, onto their customers.
  - riffic 4y ago
    lol, bofa.
- bityard 4y ago
  Instant and no-fee I can get behind but irreversible sounds like an awesome way to lose a lot of money.
  - notch656c 4y ago
    Reversibility means risk incurred on the transfer system which means not free. Reversibility to the people you pay also means you pay a premium as the vendor has to self or externally insure the risk the funds will be recalled.
  - wintermutestwin 4y ago
    I've seen it IRL. Zelle claims no responsibility and that they can't track what they sent.
    - salawat 4y ago
      Fines for failure to implement legally mandated Anti-Money Laundering measures in 3...2...1... Seriously. If they can't, it will not be long until the omission is noticed.
  - plsbenice34 4y ago
    I only ever worry of the opposite: reversibility leading to chargeback scams.
- jesprenj 4y ago
  > most of the rest of the world has had for a decade or more What specific system are you implying? In Slovenia, I can't make a bank transfer online when my bank is closed (at night). Money transfer between banks costs me 40 cents per transaction and international transfer in the EU costs me around 7 €. Maestro card is instant and free and works even when the bank is closed, but it is only used for spending money. I don't pay any fees for my bank account, since I'm younger than 27.
  - watermelon0 4y ago
    EU countries (and a few others) are part of SEPA, where we have SEPA Instant Payments, which offer instant payments between bank accounts, 24/7. Price depends on the bank (and the type of bank account you have), but it's about 1 EUR or less. --- Many countries also have local payment systems, that are usually limited to a single country. For example, in Slovenia, we have Flik Pay, which allows sending money between individuals via mobile app, without any fees, and it also works 24/7.
    - jesprenj 4y ago
      I see - probably the Nujno (urgent) checkbox on a SEPA form activates this SEPA instant payment. I know about Flik and I like the appeal of it, but I do not use it because it requires a proprietary client (NLB Pay in my case). Do you know of any public or reverse engineered specification or unofficial FOSS client?
  - newaccount74 4y ago
    > international transfer in the EU costs me around 7 € Are you sure about that? I thought with SEPA all Euro transfers within the EU have to be the same fee as national transfers, which is free for almost all consumer bank accounts in Austria. My bank charges for instant transfers on my business account (around 8€), but other than that all transfers are free.
    - jesprenj 4y ago
      You are right, I verified this now. EU payments cost me the same amount as domestic payments. The ~7 € charge I remember was probably due to conversion. I wanted to send money to Croatia, which at the time did not use Euro yet.
- baby 4y ago
  It’s also limited to 2k a day
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    The limit is up to each participating bank.
    - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
      My bank varies the limit for me each day. Sometimes I can’t transfer $1000. Sometimes I can. Once I tried to transfer $3000 over many different days. No way. Can’t do it. Customer service says the limited cannot be raised past a certain point. And they won’t tell me what the limit is.
    - baby 4y ago
      Ah interesting, well with Chase it's $2k which is quite annoying
- cle 4y ago
  > irreversible transfer Apparently they're not irreversible...
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    They're irreversible, except "unauthorized" transactions. Most scammers generate authorized transactions via trickery. Banks won't accept "I was tricked" as "unauthorized"; they only count cases of actual account compromise, and even there... https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/03/business/nightcap-zelle-fraud-warren-investigation/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/03/business/nightcap-zelle-fraud... > The bank data reviewed by Warren’s office suggest even the bulk of unauthorized cases are going unpaid. For example: PNC Bank indicated that its customers reported 10,683 cases of unauthorized payments totaling over $10.6 million. It refunded only 1,495 cases, totaling $1.46 million.
    - snotrockets 4y ago
      It doesn't matter what banks accept; they are required to by the regulator. That they try to weasel out of it just means they need to be regulated harder and at more cost to the executive suit.
      - ceejayoz 4y ago
        > It doesn't matter what banks accept; they are required to by the regulator. Regulation E (https://www.consumerfinance.gov/rules-policy/regulations/1005/2/#j https://www.consumerfinance.gov/rules-policy/regulations/100...): "'Unauthorized electronic fund transfer' means an electronic fund transfer from a consumer's account initiated by a person other than the consumer without actual authority to initiate the transfer and from which the consumer receives no benefit." How is "I willingly initiated a transfer to someone who turned out to be a scammer" within this definition?
        snotrockets 4y ago
        Competent (non-software) professionals would read the initiation as the intent, also see comment 4 there, suggesting the mindset of the regulator. As a reminder, regulations are always subject to the interpereation of the regulator, which, as history shows in the case of regulation E, tends to side with the consumers. There's a deeper story here though: * Banks are given a monopoly to almost literally print money. We ceded control of a very important facet of daily lives to them. * The cost for that is tight regulation, meant to make sure they keep the trust invested in them. * In the case of Zelle, and some other new products, banks, rushing to market, try to ignore their side of the deal. * Suggesting we should give up and accept that is morally, regulatory, and legally wrong. * Regulators and policy makers seem to agree with the above.
- imtringued 4y ago
  SEPA instant payments are pretty new but yeah even Europe has that now.
  - kergonath 4y ago
    Even before instant transfers, standard SEPA was quick and easy. The big step forward was when they let us add beneficiaries from a phone app or a website rather than by sending verification codes over snail mail, but that was a while ago now.
- Semaphor 4y ago
  From everything I heard, the system in Germany/Europe is better than ACH, but instant interbank transfers are only a few years old, and usually are not feeless.
- pxx 4y ago
  "Instant" is wrong. I've had successful Zelle transfers take upwards of 60 minutes to clear without any sort of confirmation of progress. It's a real pain.
- snotrockets 4y ago
  It isn't irreversible. No bank transfer is.

barbazoo 4y ago

https://www.zellepay.com/ https://www.zellepay.com/ for those (like me) that don't know

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

gr4yb34rd 4y ago

praise that brave reddit moderator for rushing in there to lock down the thread and remove any content that might hurt BoA's feelings.

steelframe 4y ago
Amateur moderation is awful and often exploitative. I moderated a sub for about a year. At the time I felt like I was furthering a worthy cause. In retrospect I now feel like a schmuck who basically gave free labor to a company, making the platform more attractive to advertisers. I don't expect the hours I spent combing through troll posts had any measurable impact on the "cause" that sub was nominally furthering. In general I no longer contribute content to platforms that directly leverage my contributions to more effectively pull in advertising or subscription fees. After seeing first-hand how moderators I "worked" with operate, I also assume any moderated social media content is corrupted by the moderators' biases.
- ethbr0 4y ago
  In order for moderations to be sustainable and high quality, you need a large number of people who are: (a) intelligent, (b) unbiased, (c) willing to volunteer their time without compensation, (d) happy if someone else makes a profit off their work, & (e) willing to do the job forever. There aren't many people like that. More typically, they don't understand (c) or (d) in the context of moderation, or (a) and/or (b) are lacking. And once they do understand (c) and (d), (e) evaporates.
- oliwarner 4y ago
  That was a peculiar dig at community moderation. Twitter and Facebook repeatedly show how very wrong "professional" moderators get it. Almost like caring about a topic makes you better suited to maintain a community around it. The other side of the coin is that many communities wouldn't exist without Reddit, and many wouldn't be tolerated by Reddit without moderators. Many subs have been closed for inadequate moderation. So you see it as free work, I say you get what you give. You want a nice place to chat? Pony up. Cash or effort.

ctoth 4y ago

I have long been terrified of something shaped a bit like this. Here in the US we already treat most workers like absolute garbage. If one day the Average Joe wakes up and finds that all his money is merely some electronic scribbles in a database which have mysteriously gone missing, the social unrest is probably something that most people on this site couldn't even conceptualize of. Today it's Zelle, but what happens when you and everyone you know wake up and check your bank account and get an error. Suddenly can't buy food? So on. Sure, they keep backups. You hope. Do they test restoration? What would have to go wrong deep in the depths of a financial system creaking along on 1970s technology in order to really throw a wrench in things?

tmpz22 4y ago
Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Don't daily carry a physical debit card to your largest accounts that could be easily lost or stolen. Take advantage of credit card protections, or cash. Plopping your life savings in one large savings account has never been a good idea.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- astrange 4y ago
  > Plopping your life savings in one large savings account has never been a good idea. Yeah, it should be in a tax advantaged retirement account.
notch656c 4y ago
If you have enough money in the bank to buy groceries you have enough money to take out of the bank and put in your mattress for groceries. Also HN will probably get upset for me saying this but a few grams of gold or silver or other goods easily tradeable like whiskey or ammo never hurt anybody and might buy you a pig to slaughter or something.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago

marstall 4y ago

Is this the kind of rumor that starts a "run on the bank"?

eYrKEC2 4y ago
How? The lender of last resort is the United State Government. Thank goodness the bankers will always be made whole.
- marstall 4y ago
  everybody panicking and closing their accounts?
- nostrebored 4y ago
  That doesn’t mean that a run can’t happen, just that it’s less bad than it was before real-time transfers from the fed. I imagine any such event would require a bank to massively divest which could trigger a market event as well
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > How? The lender of last resort is the United State Government. Lender of last resort makes runs less likely and lossy. It doesn’t prevent them altogether.
  - bobthepanda 4y ago
    Also, plenty of runs end in the FDIC resolving in a way that the parent bank no longer exists. Managed buyouts are preferred partially so that the government does not have to deal with the logistics of running a retail bank, but mostly because if a bank with sufficient funds takes over then there is no interruption to depositors’ access to funds.
    - jsmith45 4y ago
      The FDIC is required by law to use the plan for handling a failed bank that will cost the least to its fund. Buyouts offers that cover all insured funds are typically cheaper than directly paying out. Indeed, most commonly the buying bank will offer to take all the full balance of any insurable account, not just up to the insurance limit. The logic here seems to be that the extra from taking on those balances is usually pretty small, and it does save work on the FDIC's side as there would be fewer creditors. Thus it makes bids with that include full balances more attractive than those that don't, increasing the chance that the buyer's bid will be selected for final resolution. Of course, occasionally the winning bid is limited to just insured balances, and very occasionally, the cheapest option is for the FDIC to directly cut checks to handle the insurance side, and proceed as receiver in selling off any saleable assets and paying of creditors.

gnicholas 4y ago

When my older relatives wanted to send money to family/friends, I used to recommend Zelle, which was better than the never-heard-of-it apps they were considering. But with all the problems I keep hearing about Zelle, they're off the list. Most of them have iPhones and so I just tell them to send cash via Messages/Apple Cash. I don't know how reversible that sort of thing is, in the case of fraud, but as long as they can see the messaging history with the person before they send it, it seems like that's a pretty low risk. Any other suggestions for older adults?

neon_electro 4y ago
I no longer recommend Cash App (formerly Square Cash) because they explicitly removed the ability to have inbound transactions be automatically deposited into your bank account. They left it on for anyone who already had it on, but I specifically signed my dad up on the assumption that sending him money would be as frictionless as possible. Instead, Square/Block would love for that money to stay in the Cash App account, not actually available for him to spend in his own account. I continue to use Cash App because I continue to have this feature; if they ever remove it, I'm gone.
- gnicholas 4y ago
  I got burned by the Cash app as well, with bait-and-switch tactics around their merchant discounts. Their system had problems registering merchants correctly, so the discounts pretty much never went through for me. I tried to get support but they didn't care. I bounced.
- ezfe 4y ago
  I don't actually blame them for this, because they have to make money somehow. If they make money by having your money in your account for a few hours/days, idc. So long as they make it frictionless to start a withdrawal - a tap or two, that's all I ask.
  - neon_electro 4y ago
    I do blame them for this - they can get fucked. For my dad, Auto Cash Out was exactly the "frictionless" experience he needed, and he didn't need any of the BS Cash App wants to put in front of him. I'm happy to help Square/Block make money with my engagement/interaction with Cash App, but they clearly can't figure it out without severely harming the UX in the process. Therefore, they aren't recommended.

andrewflnr 4y ago

It's removed now. Does anyone remember enough to give the gist of what allegedly happened?

ceejayoz 4y ago
The stickied mod comment reproduces the post's contents. > If you bank with BoA check your balance this morning. Our account is negative due to thousands of dollars in Zelle transfers suddenly vanishing overnight. Calling customer service goes nowhere, just dead air. > Many other customers reporting the same problem: https://downdetector.com/status/bank-of-america/ https://downdetector.com/status/bank-of-america/
thenews 4y ago
https://www.unddit.com/ https://www.unddit.com/

elforce002 4y ago

Interesting. I don't agree with the concept of 'cashless' society. This is no paranoia, conspiracy theory. I don't know if this is the first time this happens but this is one to many times for most people. The healthy thing is to have multiple options ranging from cash, credit/debit cards, up to apps with NFC payments, etc... There has to be a limit on how much tech is too much. This goes for every human facet (medicine, law, etc). Sorry for ranting about it.

sowbug 4y ago
HN likes to trash Bitcoin, but at least you can understand where the pro-Bitcoin folks are coming from. If a cashless society is inevitable, would you prefer that all such transactions be mediated by a small number of large corporations? Or would you prefer the option of at least some of your transactions happening through a peer-to-peer system that no corporation or government controls?
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 4y ago
  Bitcoin doesn't have an undo button. I know somebody who works cybercrime and they routinely get people their money back after being scammed. If they were scammed into using bitcoin that money is gone.
  - StanislavPetrov 4y ago
    Some of us would much rather take a tiny chance at being "scammed" than the certainty of being at the mercy of the government, the banks and the payment processors. In an ideal world, both of these choices would be available to adults to manage their risks and their own finances as they saw fit, rather than being forced into the latter system "for their own good".
rocket_surgeron 4y ago
Much less digital money is lost than real money. And when digital money is lost due to fraud or error it can be restored. For example, in 30 years of banking I have lost $0.00 in digital money. Sure, there have been gas station skimmers, system outages, misplaced debit cards, but I haven't "lost" a single cent. I have lost at least $20.00 in real physical money. $0.00 < $20.00 Digitalization helps other things too, I've lost hundreds of dollars in misplaced transit cards. Back in the 90s when I was a broke punk some loser stole a transit card with ~$47 on it. That was (and is) a big deal. Others have been misplaced or damaged beyond hope. Since digital transit cards became a thing I have lost $0.00 in transit funds.

ritonlajoie 4y ago

archive (kind of) https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/bank_of_america_just_lost_all_zelle_transfers_for/ https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/ba...

kaitrain87 4y ago

Does anyone have context of the content as the original post is gone from Reddit? Also on my BoA App, I have the notification: > Please Note: Zelle transactions made between and January 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay or inconvenience. Not to discount the stress that it induces, and our expectations as customers, but hopefully it's a blimp in their servers.

ceejayoz 4y ago
"Delayed" and "get undone, leaving negative balances" aren't the same, though. The first is annoying; the second is terrifying.
steve_adams_86 4y ago
First we got bugs in our servers, now we need to learn to deblimp them? This field evolves too quickly
- elliottkember 4y ago
  ah yes, the "hindenbug"
Animats 4y ago
Correct text, copied from BoA web site: Please note: Zelle® transactions made between January 14 and January 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay or inconvenience. Phone support: "Due to extenuating circumstances, we are not able to take your call at this time."
mikequinlan 4y ago
https://www.reveddit.com/v/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/bank_of_america_just_lost_all_zelle_transfers_for/ https://www.reveddit.com/v/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/...
4y ago

DennisP 4y ago

One of the reddit comments says: > Zelle isn't problematic if you use it for its intended purpose and don't send money to complete strangers Why does it matter whether you're acquainted with the recipient?

ceejayoz 4y ago
> Why does it matter whether you're acquainted with the recipient? Because the transfers can't be canceled/reversed, so there's no recourse if the recipient is scamming you.
- snotrockets 4y ago
  This isn't true. All bank transfers and reversible. Some easier then other, but none are no-recurse, regardless what a low tier customer service agent insists. It may require more effort, and maybe someone above their pay grade, but it is possible. And Zelle itself, like all electronic bank transfers in the US, is subject to regulation E, which puts the responsibility for unauthorized transfers on the banks (minus $50, a sum that most banks would waive). Zelle themselves mention regulation E on their website: https://www.zellepay.com/financial-education/pay-it-safe/understanding-fraud-scams https://www.zellepay.com/financial-education/pay-it-safe/und... Some institutions erroneously claim that regulation E only protects from hacks: that is, if the scam was offline: someone convinced you to send them money, and you did, and got scammed, then it doesn't fall under regulation E. However, it seems the regulators disagree, and banks and Zelle do fall in line once you sternly write to their compliance department and the regulator reminding them of that.
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    Sending money to a scammer tends to be an authorized transfer; you made it yourself, intentionally. The Zelle page you said itself states "Because you authorized the payment, you may not be able to get your money back." I would not hang my hat on a Regulation E complaint in this scenario.
    - 4y ago

hungryforcodes 4y ago

Ah and Bitcoin is so dangerous. We obviously need central banks to solve all it's terrible problems. /s

BoorishBears 4y ago
Well does Bitcoin have anyone with $50 billion dollars on hand and an additional $500 billion dollar line of credit with the US government to cover things like the FTX collapse?

raincom 4y ago

"Zelle transactions made between Jan 14 and Jan 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay and inconvenience" That's what Bank of America says on the mobile app. I sent a couple of Zelle payments on Jan 15 and Jan 17. They payment I sent on Jan 15 is missing on my side. EDIT: an hour later, BofA fixed my Zelle Jan 15 transaction.

riffic 4y ago

Bank of America is a consistently terrible company. They're like the financial LastPass - avoid if at all possible.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

deleted 4y ago

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Maursault 4y ago

Zelle is the choice of scammers. Incidentally, Zelle offers no guarantees or refunds. I don't know why anyone would use Zelle under those circumstances. Some banks will automagically sign their customers up for Zelle accounts, exposing them to scam risks for which there is no resolution. Money gone.

dcist 4y ago
Yup, this happened to me. I didn't sign up for Zelle. Didn't know I even had it. I lost $3,000 and BofA refused to reverse or refund any of the charges. Total BS.
- crazygringo 4y ago
  But how? How did a scammer log into your account in order to set up a transfer?
astrange 4y ago
Whether or not they accept fraud claims isn't up to them, it's up to banking regulators. https://www.wsj.com/articles/jpmorgan-other-banks-in-talks-to-reimburse-scammed-zelle-customers-11669608886 https://www.wsj.com/articles/jpmorgan-other-banks-in-talks-t...
noahtallen 4y ago
IMO, the risk is pretty minimal. Zelle isn’t a 3rd party payment platform — it’s a feature/standard a bank implements to give you instant peer-to-peer bank transfers. Zelle the company is owned by the banks, including Bank of America. So this is just BoA adding a feature they partly created to their banking suite. That in itself isn’t a red flag. Zelle itself is also secure. You have to be fully logged into your bank account to use it! So it’s as secure as any banking service. The reason someone would use Zelle is p2p bank transfers between people you know. Like if your friend wrote you a check to cover their half of a hotel on a vacation. Just replace that with Zelle. It’s better than, say, Venmo because it goes directly between bank accounts immediately, without the intermediate third party and waiting 3 days for Venmo to give you your money. The only risk you’re exposed to is if you blindly send money to someone you don’t know, which you shouldn’t be doing on most platforms. (For example, you only really get buyer protection using goods and services type transfers on other payment apps, which have extra transaction fees.) I think the end line is that banks should have better fraud protection for bank accounts. Including debit cards, ACH, checks, and Zelle. I supposed my summary is that Zelle isn’t really unique. It’s just faster bank transfers

sschueller 4y ago

I don't understand why overdraft hasn't been outlawed. It's literally a tax on you if you make one tiny mistake or your bank make a mistake. If I dont have the money block the transaction and offer a line of credit with specific apr for those that want to be able to overdraft.

eclipxe 4y ago
That's fairly common, most banks have "overdraft protection" that works exactly how you described.
- galleywest200 4y ago
  Correct. I called my bank and had them enable this for my debit card. They made sure to clarify that ACH transactions will still go through, however.
- mullingitover 4y ago
  I've used a credit union my whole adult life and they did't offer overdraft as an option. That's because it was automatically enabled by default. This is what banks would do if they weren't predatory.
- nomagicbullet 4y ago
  It is not exactly the same thing. The commenter you are responding to is looking to avoid overdraft, not having an insurance on overdraft. I'd agree with the idea of avoiding overdraft entirely unless a customer signs up for it. I don't want transactions I can't afford to go through. I manage my accounts quite closely. For me such situation would be 99% an unintended transaction that I would like to cancel. By letting such requests go through, banks put the burden on the customers to clean up after a wrong or, in many cases, illegal transaction. YMMV.
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    Overdrafting IS opt-in. I had a bank charge me an overdraft fee. I asked them to show me my overdraft authorization. It's amazing how fast a bank can return money when they screw up.

cs702 4y ago

From BofA's website: "Zelle: A safe and easy way to send and receive money fast!"[a] BofA forgot to add: "...unless your account goes into overdraft because we somehow lost your incoming Zelle transfer." Let's hope that BoFA does right by customers. -- [a] https://www.bankofamerica.com/online-banking/mobile-and-online-banking-features/send-receive-money/ https://www.bankofamerica.com/online-banking/mobile-and-onli...

fnordpiglet 4y ago
I will bet the do for the people who wade through customer support, but the vast majority of folks likely will just improve their profits by paying fees they shouldn’t have accumulated.

hnburnsy 4y ago

Always have checking\financial accounts at two different institutions. One of them can close your accounts or have delay accessing your money at any time and never have to give you a reason.

cypress66 4y ago

Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Have some physical cash, a couple of bank accounts, stocks and bonds, cryptocurrencies, valuable items if chaos ensues (guns, ammo, fuel, etc) and so on.

helen___keller 4y ago
I’m a big fan of your list because (other than fuel), each item you list is an order of magnitude less likely to be necessary or even useful Physical cash: very likely you need it some day soon Multiple bank accounts: technical issues, fraud, etc, plenty of reasons that might make one accounts funds unavailable Stocks: if there’s bank runs or such you can have equity to fall back on Crypto: if your entire economy goes kaput but the world economy lives on, this can be useful Guns, ammo: if civilization as we know it falls apart atleast you can shoot some people before starving to death

dcist 4y ago

I got scammed by a Zelle transfer when someone used my phone (without my authorization). I didn't even know I had Zelle but it's built into the BofA app. I lost $3,000. BofA refused to refund any of the transfer or reverse it. Total trash feature. I didn't sign up for it. I don't want it. BofA signed me up for it. I'm changing banks because of it.

amluto 4y ago
The magic words are “Reg E”. Your bank won’t tell you about it, but they must follow the regulation.
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
  https://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/supmanual/cch/efta.pdf https://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/supmanual/cch/efta.... I'm not familiar with this and therefore not sure if this is the correct source but I tried to find something official.
pavlov 4y ago
How did they get access to the bank app on your phone?
- humanistbot 4y ago
  If you close the BofA app after you are done, you have to log in again with either password or biometrics. If you don't and just go to the home screen, it stays logged in.
  - tinsmith 4y ago
    This seems like a remarkable oversite on BofA's part. I'm with a comparitively tiny US credit union, and even their app demands a pin code to return to it if I switch to another app mid-session.
  - pavlov 4y ago
    In that case I’d argue the issue here is terrible security in BofA’s mobile app, not the kind of money transfer.

RektBoy 4y ago

Why don't Americans use direct money transfer from one bank account to another, like rest of the world? I lol everytime I see these problems.

IAmGraydon 4y ago
We do (ACH), but it takes 3-5 business days to complete.
- astrange 4y ago
  ACH never "completes", there's no confirmation in the system. The bank merely decided 3 days is enough time to assume there isn't a reversal coming, but some reversal reasons can be expected to take up to 60 days. Some banks have been offering "two days early payroll"; that just means they see enough transactions for your paycheck that they've decided to just trust it.
refurb 4y ago
Pretty sure a bank IT problem is going to affect direct money transfers too?

the-anarchist 4y ago

Ah, perfect, just in time for the DoJ announcing they're going after cryptographically sound and undisputable transfers of value.

whartung 4y ago

I guess I'll be the lone voice in the wilderness. We've been perfectly happy with Zelle. We use it a couple times a month to pay service providers, send money to family. Never had any issues with it, don't need an "app" for it, works with our normal bank stuff. Similarly, at the same time, we got a check recently from a settlement. We plonked it into our account, and it bounced. It was a large settlement (i.e. lots of people), and the law firm in charge of writing the checks messed up, and thus canceled all of checks and re-issued them a couple weeks later. It was a big deal. Stuff happens. Hopefully BofA owns up and refunds all of the overdraft problems, but they can't roll it all back. Bouncing checks have repercussions out of the banks control (landlords tend to frown on bounced checks, for example), which behooves them to be more diligent about things like this that can impact that. The big problem is that people are out of the loop for things like this. Computer pulls the money back, computer bounces the check, computer notes the bounced check, computer tells the other computer you bounced a check, computer craters your credit rating. There are no "people" involved in this, it's all procedures and rules and such encoding is the "logic" of one of the most inscrutable creations man has ever created -- the computer. And people have to scurry about to compensate for the vast ripple effects these things can have that impact peoples lives. So, hopefully BofA cleans up their end, but more importantly, hopefully everyone down stream is patient with those affected and helps them recover as well. And, finally, no doubt a legion of scammers will crawl out of the wood work leveraging this event to gain some advantage. Way of the world.

MuffinFlavored 4y ago
> pay service providers, send money to family how does the recipient of a zelle transaction know if it’s tax worthy (aka needs to go on 1099) or just sending money to family? i don’t see a way to “tag”/“flag” transactions same goes for cashapp
- the_reformation 4y ago
  this is a feature, not a bug
  - 4y ago

nunez 4y ago

unddit: https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/bank_of_america_just_lost_all_zelle_transfers_for/ https://www.unddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10f8042/ba...

tiffanyh 4y ago

I wonder why this only effects BofA, given that Zelle is run by EWS and many banks use the service.

dbg31415 4y ago

I hate how hard it is to do bank transfers in the US. When I was in Sydney, you just added someone's BSB and account numbers, and you could add their phone number and most apps would know how to translate that... and you could Vemno / Zelle without the app. Dirt simple. No clue why it has to be complicated in the US. Just seems moronic.

sys_64738 4y ago

BofA is a terrible bank. Safer to use a mattress.