Sovereign Bank

When I closed an IRA CD before its term was up, I was told I would lose 3 months of interest, as they were cutting the check. I was also told an additional $25.00 would be subtracted, as I broke the contract. I agreed to that as the interest rate was almost non-existent, and I had already spent a half hour with the customer service rep, who tried to get me to keep the IRA with them. I have since found out there is no fee for closing the CD, and I should not have been charged. This is the second time they have made a major mistake with my account. That is enough. They are incompetent!

I was using the drive thru service at Sovereign Bank in Robbinsville, NJ today. The teller was about to return my money, and held it up until she finished a sales pitch to me about a zero interest credit card. She didn't return the carriage until she finished her speech and I answered. I am very upset this branch is wasting my time at the drive thru to try to sell a credit card. If I want a credit card I will apply for it on my own, and I don't want to have my bank teller to try to sell it to me. I have been with Sovereign for close to 20 years. If I have this happen again, I am considering changing banks. Thank you for your time.

Ever since Sovereign Bank was taken over by Santander, there has been nothing but trouble. I've had all my accounts for many years with Sovereign Bank. I just canceled my two non-interest accounts. The incompetent worker at the bank (by phone) canceled our business account and not the personal account, just because both accounts ended with the two end numbers of "19". How ignorant can one be.

When I called to have the situation corrected, I was told there was nothing I can do about it. How absurd. It was through the incompetent worker that this happened. They probably closed our business account because this account was under the "grandfather clause" whereby no fees were charged. In order to open a new account, we would then have to adhere to the new regulations of bank fees.

How desperate is this bank getting? I've recently had some problems on this bank with their online transfers and deposits, but to close our account without our permission is the complete end. I also find it hard to believe that an error resulting from a worker cannot be rectified.

My name is John **. I was recently hit with 21 $35.00 overdraft fees in one day by Sovereign Bank. They would not let me opt out of overdraft protection because I own a small landscape company. Every other bank in the area allows businesses to opt out if the so desire. The Dodd/Frank reform act apparently only applies to consumers. I know people who are protected by this law that make more money themselves in on year than my entire companies gross sales. Please help me and sign this petition. I will be taking this as far as I can go with it! We can make change!

http://www.change.org/petitions/soverign-bank-charging-overdraft-fees-and-ignoring-the-doddfrank-bill

Sovereign/Santander sent me a letter this past summer telling me I had to deposit an additional $5,000.00 by September 1, 2011, if I did not want to pay a $30.00 fee each month for my checking account. My wife and I did not want to tie up an additional $5,000 on top of the $15,000 CD she already had with them, so I wrote a letter instructing Sovereign/Santander to close out the checking account on August 31st, and my wife's $15,000.00 CD account when it came due on September 7th. Sovereign/Santander decided not to close the checking account and when the CD came due sent the check through the closed account minus the $30.00 fee.

When I complained, the people at the bank were very officious like and told me to basically take a hike. I even sent a letter of complaint to a vice president named Melissa **, who did not acknowledge it. When I complained to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, I got an immediate response from a retail district manager named Kevin ** who also sent a check for $30.00.

It's the state of banking 2011. You use our money and screw us at will. Check your bank account daily.

Thursday, there is $5 plus in there, so you're good, paychecks are going in in the morning. Next day, over $3000 in checks go in and three overdraft fees for checks that came back overnight. Really? Overnight? So Thursday there's money, Friday there's money but in the middle of the night, checks come back and there's no money and three overdraft fees at $35 each. And your rude customer service department robots are all spouting banking 101 to me like I'm an idiot.

I have seven bank accounts with Sovereign Santander and my only recourse is to pull them all and go to another bank. Thanks, Sovereign Santander. You're doing a real good job of making us a third-world country by screwing the little guy. Thanks so much.

I opened a small business account at Sovereign Bank in 2009. The bank representative assured me that there will be no fees or charges on my account. I deposited $240 and waited for my debit card to deposit more. After two weeks of not receiving the card, I contacted Sovereign Bank to send me a new card. I haven't received the new card since, and couldn't deposit my checks through ATM. Recently, I received a letter from Sovereign bank that they charged $160 inactivity fee from my account.

I visited the bank and explained the situation and told them they don't have a right to charge me without notice. The manager told me that I have agreed and signed to pay the inactive fees, however, I look into the issue more and found out that this new regulation of $16/month inactivity fee started in October, 2010. Therefore, I definitely haven't signed such an agreement and they definitely haven't send me any notice. They unfairly, unethically and even without a notice, charged me $160 from my account.

I am not surprised but relieved to see that I am not the only one that Sovereign Bank is ripping off. I have just had $885.00 sucked out of my checking acct. from this so-called bank. Has anyone reported them to the Attn. General's office? Well, I am going to. This amount is just overdraft fees and sustained overdraft fees, in less that 1 month.

I have had cancer surgery and a hard time recovering and told them this (big deal) no-one cares, these charges are automated debits for bill payment and if the funds aren't available they keep trying so, the bank allows that because they keep receiving that fee. This is America? This isn't right and has to be stopped, I too am trying to live on SSDI and have direct deposit so, at midnight I received my deposits and $855. Came right out.

This has gone on now for the past 3 months because at that time I was over $1100 in overdraft fees, so, basically I cannot get ahead because not only is the bank hitting me, my creditors are as well. Today, the finance co. for my car were going to repossess my car if they didn't receive $627 and all the bank left me with is $471.72. I had to beg them not to take my car and had to pay them $400 today and the remainder next week, how I'm not sure. I have two children who went back to school and they had a choice of shoes or 1 outfit.

Now I know that anyone reading this is saying to themselves that I must be an **, why can't I keep track of my finances! Let me tell you, not that long ago I had a thriving Restaurant for 13 years, I was a millionaire and wanted for nothing. Now due to divorce and disability and Sovereign Bank I am where I am! What has happened to America, I'm not we quite know who our enemies are! I now am behind on all of my bills, facing repossession of my car, eviction, utility disconnect, etc.

I did not opt in to overdraft protection. I was happy to see the end to this come on August 15th. So I was stunned to see four overdrafts in a 2-day period, August 26 and 27. Several emails were ignored and when calling customer service, they just said they'd 'research' this. So today, I called the bank manager locally. She said records showed I had opted in, over the phone! This is impossible, no one is at home to answer phone during the day; this could not have been a mistake. At no time did I speak with anyone from the bank(!) until I made the complaint! So now, it's my word against theirs. I am not crazy, I did not opt into this. I wonder how many other people they are doing this to?

i had been dealing w/this bank ever since they were shawmut. i never had a problem like this before when they were shawmut and then fleet. is there any way of keeping these banks from robbing people [especaily those who could least afford this garbage]. i may not be able to do anything in july if this keeps up. im really angry about this. they dont notify you until the next month about overdrawn acct. and then they take from you. thank you for listening.

My unemployed daughter left New England in late December to relocate to North Carolina to go back to school. In the process of moving, her checking account was overdrawn. We got on the phone in mid February, and cleared the account. Her debit card was destroy, and I was assured by the on-line representative, that no additional charges would be incurred. Two weeks later, Sovereign has charged an additional $164.95 as a closing fee. When asked if they would either invoice us, or explain in detail the charges, they told us they don't work this way

In the past I was charged an over draft of over $200 for a total of $5. I was okay paying that because it was my fault for not paying attention to my account. I ended up paying the full amount after having a discussion with them. During that discussion, one of their reps also told me that as long as I deposit money into my bank account on the same day before midnight they wouldn't charge me a fee.

On 01/11/10, I had a balance of $39.11. I was aware of my balance, since I had a check with me that I knew I was going to deposit later on that day. I withdrew $40 knowing that my acct would be $.89 short. I later deposited the check I had into my acct around 5 pm, the receipt that I received from my account stated that I had a positive balance amount after I deposited the check. On 01/12/10, the next day, I checked my account and now it shows a negative balance of $35.

I called the bank and they told me since it was not a processing error and they are sorry for whoever misinformed me, but they are not going to waive the fee. I explained to them that it didn't make sense for them to charge me a $35 for an $.89 over draft fee, but they refuse to return my money and told me sorry. I even told them that the bigger banks have to waive these fees because Congress is not allowing this anymore and they just brushed me off. This has left me broke and I will not be able to afford lunch this week especially since I was counting on that money to get me through the rest of the week.

i try to dispute it with them but they said they can do nothing and so i tried to close the account and they said that i can't close it unless i pay the fee. i have no money to pay that fee and i think its not fair to charge me close to 100 dollars for only 33 cents overdrawn. they said if i don't pay that fee its going to be sent to a collection agency on to my credit report.

i set up a weekly savings of $100. through my job to have on sovereign card. this was a weekly transaction that i though was going ok. I call the 1 800 number to check my balance to discover that the bank allow 8 transactions with sufficent funds to take place then charge me $35.00 plus additional $5.00 daily fee until paid in full. in total $310.00 for purchases as low as $5.00. $35.00X 8. when speaking to the asst. manager mona alexander 3/24/09 around 3:30pm today i realize that this bank is ridiculous and i feel robbed.

the manager told me that it's my responsibilitie and not there's. that i should have check my account sooner. she was very rude and talk over me not allowing me to explain anything. i done research and saw that i'm not the only victim to have been over charge these fees. no other bank does this. maybe once they may cover a purchase but not 8 or more times with no funds in the account then charge this outrageous fees. the purchase should have been declined alerting the customer to make a deposit soon. i never received any letter stating that i have overdrawn my account and she told me i just have to wait she not the postal service she can't control when i get my mail. i will never use sovereign bank again in life neither will my friends, co-workers, family and the community where i live. this is illegal and required your expertise to investigate. thank you in advance for allowing me to tell my side. please get back to me when you can.

My daughter is 21 years old, lives on her own and really struggling to make ends meet. She makes $9/hr, her rent is $600/mo, along with all of her bills. She can't afford health insurance. Every month, the bank allows her to go over on her checking account and withdraw money. The problem is that at one point this month, she went over $6 and they charged her $33. Then she needed some food and the money wasn't in her account, but the bank allowed her to take more money out ($20), and they charged her another $33, plus the daily cost of being over in her acct.

At the end of 3 weeks, they charged her $500 in fees for going over roughly $200!! The people that this is happening to are people who don't have the money, and the banks are charging them a fortune, that is totally unreasonable. I myself could not afford the fees she is getting and I make decent money. Can the banks legally charge this kind of money to people who don't have the money to begin with??

Last month was the same situation. She is behind on her rent and her car insurance is ready to be cancelled and all her money is going to fees! Is there someone I can contact to get the money back. I contacted the bank myself and spoke with them, and they gave her back just $200 (this month, does not include the money she loses every month). Is there anything further she can do to try and get any of her money back?

Back in 07 I made the last payment on my vw or so I thought. I heared nothing about a balance being due so, I assumed my car was paid for. Two weeks ago, I got a piece of junk mail from Soverign Bank. It reminded me that I had not gotten my tytle. I called them up and spoke to a service rep.She told me that I owed five hundred fifty eight dollars and thirty three cents. I was totally shocked but sent them the payment as soon as I hung up. (I spoke to them on 1/30/09 and they should have gotten the payment on 2/6/09 confirmation #.)

I called them back today and inquired about the title and why hadn't I gotten it yet? The customer service rep asked me to stay on the line, as she did not know whom should handle my call.She then came back on and stated that her supervisor would talk to me shortly. She Then proceeds to hang up on me. I dial them back and request to speak to Ken Semonelli the supervisor. I waited and waited but no Mr. Semonelli. Apparently he was on another line. I dialed directly back after she hung up on me. Shouldn't he have been trying to get in touch with me?

Finally the customer rep comes back on and asks if I would mind talking to another supervisor. I agree and speak to V. Delrio. I asked her If she could tell me what kind of effort Sovreign Bank had made to get in touch with me. She informes me that my account is in collections. When did this happen? No one has made any effort to get in touch with me! I made all my payments on time! Why did they do this to me? I owed them one payment.

My credit is ruined! I have always made my payments on time! This is a bank who has my social security number. The dots don't connect.

It tried to make arrangement for the past due balance and they do not want to listen to me at all they do not care if I am having financial difficulties all they want is their money also I wrote to your company sever times and no one has ever responded to me please contact me asap

I have just tried to cancel and recoup charges for services billed by Payment One that Sovererign Bank never authorized. The billing rep - who refused to give me her name - wouldn't discuss these charges with me because it was against their privacy policy. She kept insisting that, without the date the charges were billed, she could not discuss this with me. The only billing dates I have are the billing dates of the Verizon invoices and that apparently was not sufficient.

I was able to provide her with the manin billing telephone number, the number to which these services were charged, and the addresses for each of the accounts. That also was not enough for her to process my requests. I then asked if there was a direct number to the companies that are ultimately receiving the revenue from these charges (Gofax.com, Enhanced Directory, and Global YP) that I could call and again she insisyed she couldn't give me any information because of privacy issues. At that point I informed her that my next call would be to my State Attorney's office to begin opening a formal complaint against Payment One.

I paid my Sovereign Mortgage bill electronically on my Sovereign Bank account. I signed into the spot where it says click here if you have a Sovereign Mortgage I like any other human being thought that there was a direct link and the bill would be immediately transfered. There is not a direct link they paid it by a hard copy check which was 5 days later than the intended date of 10/31/08 which was a late October payment. They chatised me because Sovereign doesn't have both mine and my husbands name on the hard check they sent out. It is a joint account there is no reason why I would think that only one name would be on the check. They chatised me about the account number saying it was not on the check and it was.

Finally they said the address was wrong - the PO Box which pulled up automatically when I did the initial bill. There is no reason why I would think that my account and my mortage would not be linked. That a hard check would be sent and my payment would be late. I would have gone down to the branch and paid it myself which I have done in the past.

The economic damage is difficult to assess secondary to the fact that they reported it to the credit bureaus.

I was asking for a loan for $5000.00, they told me the min amount they loan is $10000.00 at 7.5% interest to be payed back in 10years at $179.00 a month. After corrsponing back and forth sevaral times she told me that I would need to send $215.00 for a insurance fee. I told her I did not have $215.00 to send and she asked how much I could send and the remaining amount could be sent after I receive the loan because she understood the hardship I was going through and wanted to work with me.

So me being stupid, I western union $100.00 to Samuel Osagie at Sovereign Inc in Benin Edo Nigeria. Now my e-mail are going unanswered. Bottom line is I got scammed. I am out $100.00 dollars.

I use on line bill pay to pay all my bills. it took soverign over a week to pay my electric bill. it was the 4th of july weekend and i showed a 200.00 balance in my account. But most of that was going to my electric bill. i didnt bother to check my on line banking the rest of the weekend, my 90 year old father and my 3 year old grand daughter were over. apperently the electric bill hit. i dont know when because it was a holiday weekend. i was still under the old impression that my debit card would not work if i had no money in the bank to cover it. so i treated my grand daugter to a slurppy and bought some other small things.

that slurppy cost me 35.00 when that weekend was over i was over draft 145.00 plus 240 dollars in over charges. i couldnt beleive it. i went to the bank immediatly - i was hysterical. i am on disability and cant afford this. they were so rude and nasty and and said if i didnt pay right away i would be charged 5 a day per over draft. and there were so many.

i borrowed money from my son and my 90 year old dad dad and had to sell my gold jewelery to pay my son back! only got 250 for the gold so dad still isnt paid back yet. I thought in order to have over draft you had to have a savings account. i guess the banks are desperate. they are loosing money and need to get it from somewhere. so the poor as usual is where it comes from.

My checking account was charged over $200.00 in over draft fees due to use of my debit card when my account was negative unknown to me. this happened over the 4th of july weekend. i had my grand daughter and just didnt bother to make a deposit - and used my debit card to purchase small things like a slurpy at the 7 11. that slurpy cost me 35.00! when all was said and done i was overdrawn 114.00 and had an additional 240.00 in overdraft fees. this is soverign banks policy. but SI savings bank pretends to be a neighborhood bank like they used to be. when i asked where this information was they said it was on my statement - its not. Its not on the online at Soverigns web site either. i checked everywhere.

i called sovereign this morning and they said they sent the info out in 2006 when they took over SI savings. duh. this was the third or so take over of that bank, i dont remember reading all that material they sent. This bank used to call if you were in danger of an overdraft. this bank was a neighborhood bank, this bank cared. this is not the bank its pretending to be. i went to the bank and asked why they allowed the debit card to be used when there was no money in the account and they said it was for an emergency and since this never ever happened to me before i asked when this started and they said 2006. i have been a customer of this bank for about 20 years but i am on disability and naturaly dont have money.

so i am not a customer they care about. i did not have the money to make up the fees and they didnt care. they would not take them off, they would not budge. i had to sell some old gold i had that came to 240.00 and of course make the 120.00 deposit (i was going to make anyway) to make all this go away right away and they were good enough to refund one fee of 33.00. what kind of scam is this? i am sorry but i dont remember ever being able to use my debit card with no money in the bank. the bank personel were nasty and could care less. i couldnt stop crying because i didnt have any money and yes i made a mistake but my first one in 20 years! They said if i didnt pay the fees the charges would keep going up 5.00 a day.

they threatend to have me thrown out of the bank. how dare they. bet if i had a large CD or something in thier bank i wouldnt be treated this way. but its happening every day to people with little money in the bank. they are being hit with these fees when in the past they used to be stopped from using the debit card. people are not aware of it. People must be made aware of this. this put my physical and mental health into a mess. i cant explain how horrible i felt. how ill i felt inside to be treated like i was treated. and also worried that i would be arrested for writing checks with no funds.

On May 16th checks were submitted for payment out of my account using checks that were not my own. I have a personal checking account and the checks submitted were business. the checks didnt have my name or address on them only my account number. After making te discovery i contacted coustomer service to make htem aware of the situation. the person i spoke to the 1rst time basicly told me there was nothing she could do and transfered me to a supervisor. This person put a freeze on my account and told me to go into a branch and fill out an affidavid stating the check were fraudulant.

I did just that, i left work in the middle of my shift and went to the nearest branch and did the neccesary paperwork. The agent at the bank told me there was nothing else that i could do at this point that an investigation had to be done and it would take 5 business days for me to ge my money back. I called to check on the status of my account on monday and was given no asnwers as to what wa going on or being done. in the mean time i closed that account nd opened a new one. 8 days later i still hadnt been contacted by anyone or goten my money back

i called customer servie again only ro betold the same thing there is nithing they can do about it and wa again transfered to someone else. This person is in the loss provention and security dept of the bank and informed me that i had to do a police report before they would be able to refund me anything! Rediculous! They could have told me that in the begining! I then had to spend 3 hours in a police station trying to get a police report that i had to pay for! It's almost 2 weeks later and i still dont have my money back.

This is the caziest thing i have ever heard of.A bank allows someone to cash a check out of your account without your name address or signature being on the check and they give YOU a hard time about getting YOUR money back! I work hard for my money and this incidaent left my account over drawn by over 2500 dollars with me having a little under 2000 in my account prior to the incident. i am behind on paying some bills due to this and am unable to do the things i need to do.