Oh how nice of the predator to stop predating for two minutes. Huzzah huzzah. Maybe if WaMu wasn't completely composed of assholes they would have just bounced the check back to her instead of getting all wet about the $35 overdraft fee.

I thought it was illegal to turn the power off during the summer. Must be different state laws.

Just contact your local power company and inform them of the frail condition, necessary medical equipment, etc. They CANNOT then turn off your power.

@lawnmowerdeth: I know it is in Winter but I don't think they care about heat cause it can only cause heat exhaustion, heat stroke...death you know nothing as bad as freezing to death.

@lawnmowerdeth: Where I live its illegal in the winter.
Wamu did not have to budge at all here, but they did. Good for them.
So you don't want to insult me by soliciting, but still solicit? AND you have documentation to prove its her fault? That's great. For the record, I too can prove financial difficulties of my own doing so I will gladly accept donations to cowboys_fan@lickmyballs.com!

Oh, and please don't overdraft. You're just buying yourself a one-way ticket on the nonstop train to Impecuniosity City.
Yeah, avoid that if you can. We're overcrowded enough here already.

It's good, I guess. . . If it's a first offense shouldn't all the circumstances be taken into account? What would it have cost WaMu to reverse ALL the charges on their end? Michael Moore did a piece on bounced check charges years ago on TV Nation and none of the banks could break down their charges or explain why they were so high. We are so far gone now we are grateful when they show any mercy at all.

And of course, it's common knowledge that when posting checks at the end of a shift the employees are instructed to deduct the largest checks first to increase the odds of bounced charges.

Instead of bitching and complaining to the bank when it is too late, how about learn a thing or two about finanical responsibility?!

After all, it is the customers who choose which bank to do business with and how much money they spend on things.

[www.tian.cc]

GAHHH, there really needs to be a change in law here. I know all the overdrafts were her fault, but I'd like to see a max overdraft charge law. For example, 3 max overdraft charges, and then after that some sort of probation period - the customer cannot overdraft for six months or else his or her account is cut off. OR... the overdraft charge is incrementally aligned with the amount overdrafted--the higher the overdraft, the higher the fee. E.g.: $1-5 overdraft = $1 fee. $5-10 overdraft = $5 fee. $10-30 = $10 fee. Anything over $30 = $30 flat fee. OR... raise the fees per days overdrafted; 1-7 days = $20. 7-14 days =$30, etc.

Entirely unrealistic, I know, but just a thought.

On the other hand, on what did she spend the $400 that she didn't have? If it's something like food or other bills, I'm sympathetic to the Paypal solicitation. But if it was a "luxury" item, I'm not as inclined toward sympathy. No offense.

Doh! Ben already posted some numbers :P Glad I scrolled up before posting, but here's a few websites for Atlanta services I found via Google, anyway.

I work at a non-profit administering Energy Assistance to low-income families- here's a couple places to go for your mother in Atlanta (assuming you haven't already):

[www.aglc.com]
[www.southeastenergy.org]

@ingridc: I doubt it was a luxury item, come on have a heart everyone shes old and in a wheelchair. I mean I forget stuff all the time and I am still young. Yeah its her fault but WaMu and every other bank just drools at the thought og an overdraft.

I have to throw in a big thumbs-up for listing those Atlanta-area help lines. There are a lot of organizations down here helping people out with the heat.

And yes, this week we may see some temps around 105. But we'll probably top out at 101 or 102. What's scary is that this would be where I say that I miss Illinois. But it's almost the same temps up there!

while i can understand the need for them, i still kind of think overdraft fees are the most hilarious things ever. "hey, we can see that you don't have any money, so we're going to try & TAKE MORE of something that DOESN'T EXIST." haha! silly banks.

When i worked at Wells Fargo as a banker, i was never this stingy on reversing overdraft fees...i've easily reversed more than 20 for one customer.

@CaptainSemantics: Nice, we're cooler than that down here in Florida. Not much, but 10 degrees can be the difference between uncomfortable & dangerous heat.

@Tian:WHAT?!

how about reading the post and getting the point, instead of a making some generic response just so you can link to your site?

did you miss the fact that a huge multibillion dollar corporations willingly took over a thousand dollars from a 90+ year old woman?

Personal (fiscal) responsibility is a very convenient device used by the rich to blame the poor for their plight.

The fact is that banks **DO** use byzantine rules on their self-cleaning accounts so that the poor are easily trapped, the idea being that the banks do not want to deal with the poor but are outright banned from not dealing with them by law.

A smaller bank where the branch manager can actually make an executive decision would help. Trying to navigate the bloated system of a huge bank on top of the actual problem just makes it worse.

Something else to consider are financial management services. There are businesses that will manage and pay bills for the disabled or elderly who can't always deal with remembering or doing it correctly. They allot them a spending account of their personal funds after rent and utilities etc. are paid. It might be extremely helpful for someone with a family member living far away.

You could also contact the public utilities commission in that state. Sometimes they will step in if it is a situation where someone old, ill or children are going to have utilities shut off. The PUC makes those rules, I would guess the deep south has some laws about turning off an old womans air conditioning in the middle of summer.

Well, that was nice of WaMu but if you're solicting me for money, you damn well better have typed that email from the library.

" BY JEANNAIMARD AT 01:07 PM

Personal (fiscal) responsibility is a very convenient device used by the rich to blame the poor for their plight.

The fact is that banks **DO** use byzantine rules on their self-cleaning accounts so that the poor are easily trapped, the idea being that the banks do not want to deal with the poor but are outright banned from not dealing with them by law."

That is the core of the whole banking industry tactics. Our bank adopted these kind of policies over the years. They did away with youth savings accounts because they weren't making enough money off of them. Then they started to restructure all of their banking practices to highly favor those with huge account balances and did away with most of their basic offerings.
They want to cater more to those with huge amounts of money and do everything possible to deter everyone else.
Maybe it is time for small community banks and credit unions to make a big time resurgence.

How about this, no overdraft fees. No money in the acct, no payment. So check bounces. So she never could have spent 400 she did not have. Banks allow overdraft for the same reason they give people car loans. It's a way to make money off people who (by mistake or otherwise) spend more than they have. Overdraft came by way of demand; don't fuck up and you won't have to worry about fees.

There would be zero sympathy here if the person involved wasn't the most stereotypical financial "victim" one could imagine.

I can't believe he was soliciting for donations!! Instead of begging for money, why doesn't the "unemployed tech geek" get any kind of job to help his mother instead of expecting total strangers to do so? sheesh!

One thing I don't get; why would her son let them cut off her power? Is he too poor to help his mom with a single bill? If my mom were in the heat and power was going to be cut off you can rest assured I'd do everything in my power to prevent it from happening.

I don't know how far he lives from his mom, but my mom would be coming to stay with me until the power was back on, unless it's far enough that she would have to fly, and it would cost more than paying the utilities.

@floofy: I've seen power bills for a single summer month hit as $700. Low income seniors depend on A/C (perhaps more than medically necessary- I doubt a doctor will say you have to have it at 68-70 degrees when 78-80 should be just fine) and it can run a bill sky high in a heartbeat.

@ingridc: Says right in there that it was a large utilities check she forgot to enter in her checklog.
@scoobydoo: He also points out that he has already exhausted his available money trying to help her.

Reading comprehension is a valuable skill we seem to be failing to teach anymore...

I'm the guy who submitted this above and beyond. I wanted to respond to some of the comments that have been made.

First, the donations part of my post was strictly optional to even be posted, based on whether or not that part of the post would violate this site's policy - my goal was to thank Ms. Alvarez and Washington Mutual, not beg for money. If someone has donated or will, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Second, I do not know what this electric company's policy is regarding summer/heat, but she did receive notice of impending disconnection, hand delivered and left on her screen door. I do know through a family friend that they have a policy that only prevents turn-offs if they have a signed document from a doctor on file. I'm working on that.

Third, the bounced checks were for things like water, gas, supermarkets and the like. Not cable tv or booze or late night HSN knife auctions or whatever.

I'm not sure if this takes away from the above and beyond, but she's still getting WaMu letters about checks bouncing. The local branch refused to lock or close her account since it has a non-zero balance, and I don't know if these new NSF letters are ones already accounted for or checks being resubmitted and NSF'd a second time.

In this day and age, a company going out of their way at all for a customer, I think, deserves a hat's off. I think that's just a measure of today's business world, like it or lump it. WaMu went more than just a little out of their way. They could have taken my mother for a lot more than they did, but they didn't. I'm in debt to them (again, pardon the pun) for that, even if my mother did just single-handedly pay someone's salary for a week.

Good for you for helping your mom out! My parents are seniors as well, and it's so frustrating to me when they have to go through some confusing customer service issue on their own (we live on different coasts).

She's lucky to have you right there with her to go to the bank and help her out. Sorry you're both going through rough times and good luck on your job search and getting off the peanut butter banana diet.

I'm sort of abhorred that this guy is virtually pan-handling, and moreso that you here at Consumerist allowed him to do so.

It's called call the power company and apply for financial assistance. Try it.

I seriously am so irritated that any sort of solicitation was even showcased on here! Am I the only one??

@ingridc: Says right in there that it was a large utilities check she forgot to enter in her checklog.
@scoobydoo: Did you read at all? says right in the story he's exhaused his own money helping her already.

Reading comprehension is clearly a skill in danger of vanishing.

What, no comments about how the old lady should've saved more for her retirement 20 years ago so she wouldn't be in this predicament?

But anyway, yeah, I'm quite confident my mom would live with me (even if there was no space for her) if it was 105F and she had no power. For an elderly person, that's flat-out asking to die.

@Sidecutter: Yeah, we got it.

@K-Bo:

ding! ding! ding! We have a winner!

@The Bigger Unit:
Unintentional doublepost. First attempt wasn't showing here, but stuff that is clearly "after" the first one was. *shrug*

@pinkbunnyslippers: No, but I think you were fooling yourself if you expected any higher standards.

I'm somewhat surprised more weren't overturned, especially since they all stemmed from one (series of) event(s). Usually a story half this good will be enough for them to overturn the overdrafts.

I'm also surprised the son is letting her go through this alone, perhaps there are some circumstances not accounted for (there always are) but really, seems unlikely that he'd just let her sit at home with no power in the middle of August.

@Sidecutter: I think the point people are trying to make when they ask why he's not helping is has he given up cable ect, or is he saying but but but? I would max out my credit cards/ give up cable & cell phone and anything else I could to keep my parents alive. I think the question being asked is if he REALLY did all he could. And if between them they are living basically less than $1000 from this type of situation, something really needs to be done. Take a job at Mc Donald's or something. I know it's hard to dig yourself out, I've been there. But living within one minor problem of being broke just doesn't work unless you have rich relatives willing to dig you out.

The thing that I find interesting is the amount of transactions she made after forgetting the $400 bill. 20 transactions (equaling $400, so about $20 average per transaction) without checking her bank account balance, that we can only assume were made on credit or check. I'm sorry but anyone who willfully makes that many transactions without checking their levels deserves a little slap on the wrist.

Like the common sentiment that the elderly should be tested in their old age to be able to handle an automobile, similarly shouldn't some sort of financial guidance be administered? This falls solely on the son's shoulders. If i had a mother as invalid as the one he describes who is truly only taking in 1 grand a month, I would make damn sure to monitor her bank account since she obviously can't handle it herself.

Irresponsible son and careless old lady notwithstanding however, over 1 grand in overdraft fees is ludicrously excessive (as the whole damn system is corrupt to begin with, but that's a rant for another day.)

Oh, people who are wailing about financial responsibility and whatnot, have you never made a mistake? It's very easy in the land o' banking to make a little mistake that snowballs into something much, much larger. I'd like to express horror instead that our elderly citizens have to worry so much about medications versus electricity. These are matters of survival.

Ben- Okay, yeah, so the internet panhandling was a little tacky. But seriously, thanks for posting this. More people than you know are left with the responsibility of caring for aging parents, and a ridiculous percentage of the elderly live in poverty. You've also brought up the importance of helping older people figure out their bills and accounts and all that. It's easy for us to sit around and read blogs like Consumerist that tell us how not to screw ourselves over or be screwed over, but most older people don't have that luxury.

@Yourhero88: Most people her age aren't aware of online and phone banking. They were taught to balance their account. Since she forgot the large payment, by her calculations she had money. My grandmother wouldn't be able to hear her balance on a phone, and thinks computers are just fancy big picture frames my Brother and I bring over to show her pictures. You can't teach an old dog new tricks.

She needs to belong to a credit union.

And I think the customer made a mistake by accepting the bank's premise that it was all her fault. In truth, it may not have been the customer's fault at all.

This is because banks often use a strategy designed to purposefully maximise the number of bounced checks. They do this by debiting checks from largest amount to smallest amount, not the order in which they reached the bank. This ensures the bank receives a maximum number of penalty fees.

In the case above, had the customer's small checks been cashed before the large utility check, she may have have only bounced a single check!

When banks are shown that the smaller checks should actually have been debited first, they will sometimes (often) reverse most or all of the charges.

As the poster found out, all fees are negotiable, it only depends on how nice you are, how persistent you are, and whom you speak with. He had 10 of the fees rescinded, I think he had (and may still have) a good chance of having 19 or 20 of them rescinded,

That said, the vast majority of Credit Unions don't use these sleazy tactics. Join a credit union and stop being used by the banking industry.

@Nemesis_Enforcer: You are correct, at least here in MO, and the same is true in IL. Utilities may not turn off power if the temp drops below a certain level -- but they're free to cut you off if you stop padding their profits, even in the middle of the worst heat wave in quite a while (102-103 lately).

There's action begun every year to change this, but every year the bills fail to pass. How many people have to die before something is done?

@K-Bo: OK, so what's his whole situation? You must know, if you're posting that kind of criticism.

Let me play devil's advocate here ...

My mother is in her mid-60's and (thankfully) is in good health. She's put my name as co-owner on her checking and savings and told me that she's depending on me to intervene if it looks like she's starting to go a little flakey.

But look at the situation above ... this was Ben's mother's first financial mistake. Ben isn't an irresponsible son ... he's just now seeing that his mother needs help with her bookkeeping and such.

So, even though my Mom's put my name on her account, this post has shown me that by the time I *discover* she's gone flakey, she could be in *way* over her head. One mistake can equal hundreds (if not thousands) in fees and bank charges.

NEW RULE FOR SUBMITTING TO CONSUMERIST:

You must give your entire life story, no matter how inane the detail, including a detailed medical and financial history so that we, the Consumerist commenters, can fully rip you a new asshole for having any sort of problem occur.

@Sidecutter: I read it just fine thank you very much. I just don't understand how it is possible in this day and age to have ZERO access to money. I'm guessing his mom is in her 60's, so he's what? 25? 30?

A 30 year old who doesn't have access to any money to keep his mom's power on is a bigger problem than the mom that made a mistake. I'd be selling off all my crap to keep her cool if I ever got in his situation.

@K-Bo: Right on K-Bo.

Now for my 2 cents. He stated they are still getting hit with NSFs? Ask the bank to return checks as NSF after the first try. Most banks will allow the same check to come through a second time (say next batch cycle or next day) and you are hit with more fees for the exact same problem. I currently have this on my Credit Union account because I had a problem about 10 years ago. I forgot all about it until I opened a new account with them and they asked if I wanted to have the same note attached to my new account.

@floofy: Who says he's not trying to find work? Good lord, not everyone can snap their fingers and get a job. Lord knows I've gone through many years of job searching before, with the crummy low wage jobs not bringing me on cause they know I'll leave as soon as I find something in my career line. (apologies if you were making a funny)

@The Walking Eye: I am currently picking out pieces of potato chip that got lodged in the keyboard because I laughed so hard. I currently blame you for my inability to type the last letter of the alphabet. That *so* made my day.