by Brian Wolfman
Following up on Jeff Sovern's post yesterday on the Federal Reserve's new rule that will bar banks from imposing certain overdraft fees unless the consumer opts in, check out this article in today's Washington Post. As Jeff's post indicated, the new Fed rule, to go into effect next July, will require consumer opt-in for overdrafts on one-time debit-card overcharges and ATM withdrawals. The Post article explains that these two types of transactions account for about 49% of all overdrafts. (Check writing accounts for another 30%.) The Post article goes on to discuss relevant pending legislation, some of which goes further than the Fed rule and would impose limits on the the number and size of overdraft fees even for customers who opt in. A bill sponsored by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) would include check writing overdrafts in the opt-in regime, in addition to the ATM and debit-card overdrafts included in the Fed rule.
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