I have long been terrified of something shaped a bit like this. Here in the US we already treat most workers like absolute garbage. If one day the Average Joe wakes up and finds that all his money is merely some electronic scribbles in a database which have mysteriously gone missing, the social unrest is probably something that most people on this site couldn't even conceptualize of.
Today it's Zelle, but what happens when you and everyone you know wake up and check your bank account and get an error. Suddenly can't buy food? So on. Sure, they keep backups. You hope. Do they test restoration? What would have to go wrong deep in the depths of a financial system creaking along on 1970s technology in order to really throw a wrench in things?
I work for a bank in the US, and not one of the names you hear associated with scandals all the time. The level of redundancy and HA built into our everything is why our jobs are so boring and slow. We also use a core banking platform that lots of other banks use and it's properly engineered for the kind of enterprise performance we'd all expect. There are certainly problems in banking, but the FDIC protections are also there for consumers. Let's start with a reasonable premise, not a fear-mongering one.
> one day the Average Joe wakes up and finds that all his money is merely some electronic scribbles in a database which have mysteriously gone missing, the social unrest is probably something that most people on this site couldn't even conceptualize
Isn’t this what happened during the Great Depression? Exactly what you described except instead of “scribbles in a database” it’s people’s physical money in banks. This is literally where the term “bank run” comes from
The depression certainly had unrest, idk how great but it happened in the 1930s so I would expect things would be much worse if something like that were to happen today.
I understand the idea of "if you take everything from someone, what makes them keep to the law", but it's pretty obvious people don't work that way.
There are plenty of scam victims who lose all their savings to individuals or groups. How many of them do you hear of visiting the scammers' office with a pump gun? The sue, they hope for justice, they drink themselves to death, but that's about it. There are some exceptions, but they're super rare.
I know people working for banks in France and they basically have bugs sometimes where their customers are debited or credited twice. It’s a bunch of legacy xml protocols used for settlements and they sometimes have to pull a bunch of people to manually go through the books and fix mistakes. It’s insane to me that not more has blew up so far. I guess in a way banks truly are decentralized and so one bank fucking up doesn’t necessarily affect other banks.
I saw this happen with my own eyes in 2008 -- the trick was to re-order transactions such that an overdraft is triggered before other small transactions, to rack up overdraft charges.
Secondly, a Wells Fargo in California told a daily customer at the window in a bank "your cash deposit will not be credited until the next day" ..
both of these stories are completely true, at the same time as the Washington Mutual Bank failure.
There was a 1 week time when I had literally 0 to my name because all my money was tied up in bank transfers. It was unnerving.
When zelle first came out, my bank fudged an api call and basically sent my money backwards... which made the transfer crash. Took me a month, they couldn't recover the transfer and just had to credit me the missing cash.
Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Don't daily carry a physical debit card to your largest accounts that could be easily lost or stolen. Take advantage of credit card protections, or cash.
Plopping your life savings in one large savings account has never been a good idea.
20 years ago I wrote software to automatically scan paper checks, OCR and MICR data, and then do ACH transactions...
After seeing all the problems and insecurity in the banking system I now keep at minimum of 1 month of expenses in hard cash in my safe at all times, and I have multiple accounts at different credit unions, and I stop using banks completely.
If you have enough money in the bank to buy groceries you have enough money to take out of the bank and put in your mattress for groceries.
Also HN will probably get upset for me saying this but a few grams of gold or silver or other goods easily tradeable like whiskey or ammo never hurt anybody and might buy you a pig to slaughter or something.
I got scammed by a Zelle transfer when someone used my phone (without my authorization). I didn't even know I had Zelle but it's built into the BofA app. I lost $3,000. BofA refused to refund any of the transfer or reverse it. Total trash feature. I didn't sign up for it. I don't want it. BofA signed me up for it. I'm changing banks because of it.
My girlfriend also lost 3000. Somehow money was sent from her phone to someone in Texas. We contacted chase and they said "you did it" so no refunds. But we didn't! She works from home and there is no other IP other than her phone in her Chase account. So how did this happen? We filed a complaint with the Police and tried to figure out what we can do through other channels. Turns out nobody cares!
You let someone use your phone and they were able to open BoA app and transfer funds without your knowledge? I don't fault BoA for ignoring your claim, that's like handing someone a credit card and acting surprised when they use it and wanting the CC company to refund your money.
take them to small claims court, $25 to file online. It costs them money to respond otherwise you get a summary judgment in your favor. Only way to get them to change is to flood them with costly procedures.
Does anyone have context of the content as the original post is gone from Reddit?
Also on my BoA App, I have the notification:
> Please Note: Zelle transactions made between and January 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay or inconvenience.
Not to discount the stress that it induces, and our expectations as customers, but hopefully it's a blimp in their servers.
Interesting. I don't agree with the concept of 'cashless' society. This is no paranoia, conspiracy theory. I don't know if this is the first time this happens but this is one to many times for most people.
The healthy thing is to have multiple options ranging from cash, credit/debit cards, up to apps with NFC payments, etc...
There has to be a limit on how much tech is too much. This goes for every human facet (medicine, law, etc).
When my older relatives wanted to send money to family/friends, I used to recommend Zelle, which was better than the never-heard-of-it apps they were considering. But with all the problems I keep hearing about Zelle, they're off the list. Most of them have iPhones and so I just tell them to send cash via Messages/Apple Cash. I don't know how reversible that sort of thing is, in the case of fraud, but as long as they can see the messaging history with the person before they send it, it seems like that's a pretty low risk.
I no longer recommend Cash App (formerly Square Cash) because they explicitly removed the ability to have inbound transactions be automatically deposited into your bank account.
They left it on for anyone who already had it on, but I specifically signed my dad up on the assumption that sending him money would be as frictionless as possible. Instead, Square/Block would love for that money to stay in the Cash App account, not actually available for him to spend in his own account.
I continue to use Cash App because I continue to have this feature; if they ever remove it, I'm gone.
Brit here- I usually send money to friends and family using bank transfers with internet banking- it’s instant, there’s no fee (AFAIK) and all you need are someone’s account number, and sort code, which everyone has.
Is this just not an option in the states? It’s insane to me that y’all use (need??) third party apps for something as simple as sending money around.
It wont be a popular answer here but Facebook Pay now Meta Pay is a great product. It is instant, as in, you can send someone standing in front of an ATM money, and they can pull the money out seconds later. Not pending, but completed deposits. For free.
It is the "it just works" way to move money between peoples debit cards in the US. It is rock solid, a large network of us use it all the time, and it is significantly more frictionless than Paypal/Venmo/Cashapp/Zelle when you already talk on Messenger. 4 clicks and the money appears.
I've never recommended Zelle. Tales of their complete lack of customer service, consumer protection, and unwillingness to be held accountable are not new. ACH is archaic (and has its own dangers e.g. pull transactions) but it generally works.
I guess I'll be the lone voice in the wilderness. We've been perfectly happy with Zelle.
We use it a couple times a month to pay service providers, send money to family. Never had any issues with it, don't need an "app" for it, works with our normal bank stuff.
Similarly, at the same time, we got a check recently from a settlement. We plonked it into our account, and it bounced. It was a large settlement (i.e. lots of people), and the law firm in charge of writing the checks messed up, and thus canceled all of checks and re-issued them a couple weeks later. It was a big deal. Stuff happens.
Hopefully BofA owns up and refunds all of the overdraft problems, but they can't roll it all back. Bouncing checks have repercussions out of the banks control (landlords tend to frown on bounced checks, for example), which behooves them to be more diligent about things like this that can impact that.
The big problem is that people are out of the loop for things like this. Computer pulls the money back, computer bounces the check, computer notes the bounced check, computer tells the other computer you bounced a check, computer craters your credit rating. There are no "people" involved in this, it's all procedures and rules and such encoding is the "logic" of one of the most inscrutable creations man has ever created -- the computer. And people have to scurry about to compensate for the vast ripple effects these things can have that impact peoples lives.
So, hopefully BofA cleans up their end, but more importantly, hopefully everyone down stream is patient with those affected and helps them recover as well. And, finally, no doubt a legion of scammers will crawl out of the wood work leveraging this event to gain some advantage. Way of the world.
Zelle is the choice of scammers. Incidentally, Zelle offers no guarantees or refunds. I don't know why anyone would use Zelle under those circumstances. Some banks will automagically sign their customers up for Zelle accounts, exposing them to scam risks for which there is no resolution. Money gone.
"Zelle transactions made between Jan 14 and Jan 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay and inconvenience"
That's what Bank of America says on the mobile app. I sent a couple of Zelle payments on Jan 15 and Jan 17. They payment I sent on Jan 15 is missing on my side.
EDIT: an hour later, BofA fixed my Zelle Jan 15 transaction.
Amateur moderation is awful and often exploitative.
I moderated a sub for about a year. At the time I felt like I was furthering a worthy cause. In retrospect I now feel like a schmuck who basically gave free labor to a company, making the platform more attractive to advertisers. I don't expect the hours I spent combing through troll posts had any measurable impact on the "cause" that sub was nominally furthering.
In general I no longer contribute content to platforms that directly leverage my contributions to more effectively pull in advertising or subscription fees. After seeing first-hand how moderators I "worked" with operate, I also assume any moderated social media content is corrupted by the moderators' biases.
The problem is that most of the time, threads like that quickly devolve. They go from intelligent, thoughtful conversation about an issue to people ranting, throwing insults, personal attacks, etc. Or just armchair financial experts giving terrible advice. (Par for the course with that particular subreddit)
Money can quickly become a heated discussion. I'd assume behind that thread is a wall of much worse comments that had to be removed. Removing them all gets exhausting, and sometimes it's better to just lock the thread and move on.
I really don't think they care one way or the other about BoA.
I hate how hard it is to do bank transfers in the US.
When I was in Sydney, you just added someone's BSB and account numbers, and you could add their phone number and most apps would know how to translate that... and you could Vemno / Zelle without the app.
Dirt simple.
No clue why it has to be complicated in the US. Just seems moronic.
Always have checking\financial accounts at two different institutions. One of them can close your accounts or have delay accessing your money at any time and never have to give you a reason.
[+] [-] ctoth|3 years ago|reply
Today it's Zelle, but what happens when you and everyone you know wake up and check your bank account and get an error. Suddenly can't buy food? So on. Sure, they keep backups. You hope. Do they test restoration? What would have to go wrong deep in the depths of a financial system creaking along on 1970s technology in order to really throw a wrench in things?
[+] [-] browningstreet|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|3 years ago|reply
This overdramatises commonplace clerical errors.
[+] [-] armchairhacker|3 years ago|reply
The depression certainly had unrest, idk how great but it happened in the 1930s so I would expect things would be much worse if something like that were to happen today.
[+] [-] e_i_pi_2|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fnordpiglet|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] luckylion|3 years ago|reply
There are plenty of scam victims who lose all their savings to individuals or groups. How many of them do you hear of visiting the scammers' office with a pump gun? The sue, they hope for justice, they drink themselves to death, but that's about it. There are some exceptions, but they're super rare.
[+] [-] satvikpendem|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baby|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mistrial9|3 years ago|reply
Secondly, a Wells Fargo in California told a daily customer at the window in a bank "your cash deposit will not be credited until the next day" ..
both of these stories are completely true, at the same time as the Washington Mutual Bank failure.
[+] [-] Justsignedup|3 years ago|reply
When zelle first came out, my bank fudged an api call and basically sent my money backwards... which made the transfer crash. Took me a month, they couldn't recover the transfer and just had to credit me the missing cash.
[+] [-] tmpz22|3 years ago|reply
Plopping your life savings in one large savings account has never been a good idea.
[+] [-] phpisthebest|3 years ago|reply
After seeing all the problems and insecurity in the banking system I now keep at minimum of 1 month of expenses in hard cash in my safe at all times, and I have multiple accounts at different credit unions, and I stop using banks completely.
[+] [-] __MatrixMan__|3 years ago|reply
What a great opportunity it would be to build something new based on things we actually value and not on threats made by dead men:
> This gold thing with my face on it is more valuable than other gold things without my face, and if you disagree I'll kill you.
-- Julius Caesar
... and we've been following that pattern ever since.
[+] [-] 2OEH8eoCRo0|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] webdoodle|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] closeparen|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notch656c|3 years ago|reply
Also HN will probably get upset for me saying this but a few grams of gold or silver or other goods easily tradeable like whiskey or ammo never hurt anybody and might buy you a pig to slaughter or something.
[+] [-] zaphod420|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dcist|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hojjat12000|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notyourwork|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pavlov|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nazgulnarsil|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sschueller|3 years ago|reply
If I dont have the money block the transaction and offer a line of credit with specific apr for those that want to be able to overdraft.
[+] [-] kaitrain87|3 years ago|reply
Also on my BoA App, I have the notification:
> Please Note: Zelle transactions made between and January 17 may be delayed in occurring and posting to accounts as requested. Transfers will be completed and will appear in your account activity and balances as soon as possible. We apologize for any delay or inconvenience.
Not to discount the stress that it induces, and our expectations as customers, but hopefully it's a blimp in their servers.
[+] [-] elforce002|3 years ago|reply
The healthy thing is to have multiple options ranging from cash, credit/debit cards, up to apps with NFC payments, etc...
There has to be a limit on how much tech is too much. This goes for every human facet (medicine, law, etc).
Sorry for ranting about it.
[+] [-] gnicholas|3 years ago|reply
Any other suggestions for older adults?
[+] [-] neon_electro|3 years ago|reply
They left it on for anyone who already had it on, but I specifically signed my dad up on the assumption that sending him money would be as frictionless as possible. Instead, Square/Block would love for that money to stay in the Cash App account, not actually available for him to spend in his own account.
I continue to use Cash App because I continue to have this feature; if they ever remove it, I'm gone.
[+] [-] explodingwaffle|3 years ago|reply
Is this just not an option in the states? It’s insane to me that y’all use (need??) third party apps for something as simple as sending money around.
[+] [-] basch|3 years ago|reply
It is the "it just works" way to move money between peoples debit cards in the US. It is rock solid, a large network of us use it all the time, and it is significantly more frictionless than Paypal/Venmo/Cashapp/Zelle when you already talk on Messenger. 4 clicks and the money appears.
[+] [-] throw7|3 years ago|reply
https://www.federalreserve.gov/paymentsystems/fednow_about.h...
[+] [-] inferiorhuman|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ZeroCool2u|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] whartung|3 years ago|reply
We use it a couple times a month to pay service providers, send money to family. Never had any issues with it, don't need an "app" for it, works with our normal bank stuff.
Similarly, at the same time, we got a check recently from a settlement. We plonked it into our account, and it bounced. It was a large settlement (i.e. lots of people), and the law firm in charge of writing the checks messed up, and thus canceled all of checks and re-issued them a couple weeks later. It was a big deal. Stuff happens.
Hopefully BofA owns up and refunds all of the overdraft problems, but they can't roll it all back. Bouncing checks have repercussions out of the banks control (landlords tend to frown on bounced checks, for example), which behooves them to be more diligent about things like this that can impact that.
The big problem is that people are out of the loop for things like this. Computer pulls the money back, computer bounces the check, computer notes the bounced check, computer tells the other computer you bounced a check, computer craters your credit rating. There are no "people" involved in this, it's all procedures and rules and such encoding is the "logic" of one of the most inscrutable creations man has ever created -- the computer. And people have to scurry about to compensate for the vast ripple effects these things can have that impact peoples lives.
So, hopefully BofA cleans up their end, but more importantly, hopefully everyone down stream is patient with those affected and helps them recover as well. And, finally, no doubt a legion of scammers will crawl out of the wood work leveraging this event to gain some advantage. Way of the world.
[+] [-] Maursault|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] raincom|3 years ago|reply
That's what Bank of America says on the mobile app. I sent a couple of Zelle payments on Jan 15 and Jan 17. They payment I sent on Jan 15 is missing on my side.
EDIT: an hour later, BofA fixed my Zelle Jan 15 transaction.
[+] [-] riffic|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ritonlajoie|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] DennisP|3 years ago|reply
> Zelle isn't problematic if you use it for its intended purpose and don't send money to complete strangers
Why does it matter whether you're acquainted with the recipient?
[+] [-] marstall|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gr4yb34rd|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] steelframe|3 years ago|reply
I moderated a sub for about a year. At the time I felt like I was furthering a worthy cause. In retrospect I now feel like a schmuck who basically gave free labor to a company, making the platform more attractive to advertisers. I don't expect the hours I spent combing through troll posts had any measurable impact on the "cause" that sub was nominally furthering.
In general I no longer contribute content to platforms that directly leverage my contributions to more effectively pull in advertising or subscription fees. After seeing first-hand how moderators I "worked" with operate, I also assume any moderated social media content is corrupted by the moderators' biases.
[+] [-] Night_Thastus|3 years ago|reply
Money can quickly become a heated discussion. I'd assume behind that thread is a wall of much worse comments that had to be removed. Removing them all gets exhausting, and sometimes it's better to just lock the thread and move on.
I really don't think they care one way or the other about BoA.
[+] [-] cs702|3 years ago|reply
"Zelle: A safe and easy way to send and receive money fast!"[a]
BofA forgot to add:
"...unless your account goes into overdraft because we somehow lost your incoming Zelle transfer."
Let's hope that BoFA does right by customers.
--
[a] https://www.bankofamerica.com/online-banking/mobile-and-onli...
[+] [-] RektBoy|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dbg31415|3 years ago|reply
When I was in Sydney, you just added someone's BSB and account numbers, and you could add their phone number and most apps would know how to translate that... and you could Vemno / Zelle without the app.
Dirt simple.
No clue why it has to be complicated in the US. Just seems moronic.
[+] [-] tiffanyh|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] andrewflnr|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hnburnsy|3 years ago|reply