Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) is calling on Wells Fargo to disclose the size of a potential problem with two of its popular checking accounts that may have left some customers confused about how to avoid fees, the Washington Post reported. The bank’s Everyday Checking and Opportunity Checking accounts both include a $10 monthly charge except if the customer meets one of several conditions, including making 10 transactions a month. But some customers may not have realized ATM withdrawals didn’t count toward those transactions, the bank has acknowledged. Wells Fargo potentially collected “hundreds of millions of dollars” in fees from customers confused by the rules, Porter said in a letter yesterday to the bank’s chief executive, Charles W. Scharf. The bank provided “incomplete information over a span of multiple years” even though it knew some customers were “confused” by its policies, Porter said in a letter to two of the bank’s regulators, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Trade Commission. The confusion led some customers to unexpectedly trigger more fees by overdrawing their accounts, she said. Read more.
Porter was the provided an address at ABI's luncheon at NCBJ's annual conference. Video of the address will be coming soon to ABI social media!