Today’s Consumer Financial Protection Circular on surprise overdraft fees and the CFPB’s compliance bulletin on surprise depositor fees lay out when a financial institution’s back-end penalties likely break the law. When a consumer deposits a check that bounces, banks sometimes charge a fee to the depositor, usually in the range of $10 to $19. However, a person trying to deposit a check has no idea or control over whether the check will clear, and sometimes, that person is the victim of check fraud. In fact, there are many reasons deposited checks can bounce, and the most common reason is that the check originator does not have enough money available in their account. Charging a fee to the depositor penalizes the person who could not anticipate the check would bounce, while doing nothing to deter the originator from writing bad checks.
The bulletin explains that indiscriminately charging these depositor fees, regardless of circumstances, likely violates the Consumer Financial Protection Act.
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