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The money must flow: Citizens Bank sues armored-car company
By adamg on Wed, 04/15/2015 - 7:46pm
Citizens Bank this week sued the armored-car company that shuttles money to and from its branches and ATMs to make the company keep doing that until the bank can fully replace it.
In its suit, filed in US District Court in Boston, Citizens said Garda Atlantic had threatened to stop all its service today, a move that would have left "thousands of individuals and small businesses" unfairly without access to their money.
Citizens is in the process of moving to a new armored-car service, but says its contract with Garda requires it to continue operating for up to 180 days after the end of its contract just in case Citizens' new company can't get fully up to speed that fast, which Citizens said happened.
Citizens alleged Garda executives "cannot wait to teach a bank a lesson" because of a dispute over just how much Citizens owes Garda.
After Citizens filed a request for a temporary restraining order to keep the money flowing, Garda today agreed it would continue to provide "cash in transit" services through May 12.
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| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
 Complete copy of the Citizens Bank complaint | 161.75 KB |
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Comments
Ha!
I recently closed a business account at Citizens. When the nice man asked me why I was leaving Citizens, I replied, "You seem like a very nice man who just happens to be working for thieves"
I then explained how his bank told me I was crazy when one time my landlady forgot and put in a post dated check early. Transactions that had already shown cleared were all of a sudden bounced back and I had a tidy sum owed to a bank that had previous cleared my transactions by way of overdraft charges.
Come to find out that later on the bank admitted that they were engaged in purposely bouncing previously cleared transactions in an effort to generate fraudulent overdraft charges. I think they paid a fine for stealing and Bob's your uncle.
Moral: Institutionalized crime pays better than street crime. And stay the fuck away from Citizen's Bank. They make Goldman Sachs look like ham and eggers.
they've been
They've been doing this for years. This was one of the main reasons why I left in 2004 and went to credit union. I was tired of being fee'd to death with their business practices. Sure, maybe I shouldn't be bouncing checks, but it pretty clear they were holding deposits and pushing the charges in first so they could rack up the fees.
I think the icing of the cake one day was the 150 dollars I paid in fees for being under by a few dollars. They could have sent my direct deposit in first, and then all the charges, but they did the reverse. And of course when you realized they were doing this and brought it to their attention, you were wrong and they were right and refused to refund any of the feeds. And they were extremely arrogant about it too.
I had enough. I closed my accounts and went to a credit union. I never looked back.
I very glad they were caught doing this, sued, and lost. But they now have found other ways to fee to you death. My fav is the 10 dollar fee they charge to cash one of their own checks at a branch? really? 10 bucks to honor one of your checks because I'm not a customer? (even though the payer is a customer). What a bunch of criminals.
And yet they're still better
And yet they're still better than BoA
and
what really gets my goat about these fees is that.. many people don't know they are being charged. I'm the last person on earth that actually religiously balances his checkbook (via Excel) so I see every charge. Many people do not, and probably are being fee'd and don't know about it (or just do not care).
They really take advantage of customers this way (in a bad way)
ONE of the last!
I have a 24-column google spreadsheet budget that I keep out to a year and manually update with the figures from my online banking. If numbers look off when I update the balance, I go line by line through my transactions. High fives for paying attention to your money!
I do it
line by line.. just like a paper check register. I save all my receipts and enter them in. And people ask "why on God's green earth do you bother"
Because.. I've been over charged before (mainly restaurants where people usually can't read my chicken scratch of handwriting in the tip line).
But to stay on topic.. it's mainly because of the fees from Citizens Bank i was getting when I had that bank. Which is how I knew I was being fee'd to death. You start to categorize them and run a report and realize that you've given away hundreds of dollars in fees every year.
Plus I feel that if you enter everything in, you learn where your money goes. Even when I slack off, I come back a week later and I'm like "really? I spent 50 bucks on coffee this week?"
Citizens...blech
The $17 a month maintenance fee they charged me pushed me over the edge. First it was a fee, then they said "if you have direct deposit, you don't need to pay it." When I informed them that I did, "oh, well then you shouldn't have been charged." Yes. I know.
Didn't get charged for about 8 months, then, ta da! another $17 maintenance charge. Walk into the bank, say "I'm closing my account, give me my money."
The nice lady from the customer retainage department department assured me that if I left my money in their bank they would wave the fee that was associated with a $2500 minimum balance...in a checking account.
I told her in no uncertain terms that the company she worked for was run by pieces of garbage, and promptly opened my accounts in a local credit union. I've been happy every since...though they've recently been bought by a different local bank...so we'll see how that goes.
How can a bank buy a credit
How can a bank buy a credit union? I thought credit unions are not-for-profit organizations.
I think
I think he means his bank was bought out by another credit union. Credit Unions can buy each other, as mine bought out the State Employees Credit Union a few years ago.
Every bank is doing it. How
Every bank is doing it. How is any bank or credit union different ? Please name one that does'nt and give an example and not just "it hasn't happened to me there yet" because it didn't happen at Citizens yet either until that first time, did it ? You take it up the rear and pay or else you get your account canceled and you get permanently blacklisted with the agency all banks use for this purpose so that you will never be able to open a bank account anywhere ever again and you get your credit report dinged and maybe you also get a civil judgement against you and maybe if you are really unlucky a larceny complaint.
I remember a certain senator who campaigned hard on this issue, but where are they now ? Nothing has been done.
How is any bank or credit union different ?
North Easton Savings Bank.
I have no-fee checking that I've had since 2004. I had occasional overdrafts when I was a young'n who didn't know how managing money worked, but haven't ever seen them do anything that made me go "uhhhh...why did you put those debits & deposits in that order?". They've never screwed me for a fee- which BofA did numerous times in the year or so that I had an account with them.
There is something to be said for small local banks.
yup same here
I was trying to prevent from saying my bank's name (b/c it's NOYB), but I like them so much I'll give them a plug. I have Metro Credit Union.
My first checking and savings are free. No fees ever. It's their Rewards Checking. Hell, I get paid to have that account... made 24 dollars last year in 'rewards' in December. Oh and I get 100% refunds (up to 30 dollars) in other banks ATM fees. (my bank never charges me to use an ATM on this account)
My secondary checking is a basic account, still free.. no rewards tho. I do get charged for ATMs, but its a backup account so I rarely use the debit card off that account.
My savings accounts (the 2nd account and beyond) isn't free. I have to keep a 150 dollar minimum in it, or I get charged 3 dollars. Sure it's a fee, but I can manage to keep 150 in there, or just eat the 3 dollars. Far better than Citizens's 1500 minimum and a 17 dollar fee. And even still, if I go into the bank and complain, they usually give me the $ back with little push back.
But generally I just get such good service from Metro. The employees are great and helpful. This is why I'm there. Plus I'm a member, so I do have a say in what the bank is doing and what fees they charge. And they really support the local communities where their branches are. And this is important to me too.
Metro Credit Union is the states fastest, and 2nd largest Credit Union. (next to DCU, which also gets high remarks from its members)