Another bank overhauls its overdraft policy

If you're a customer of BB&T Corp, a bank in 13 states and Washington, D.C., and haven't heard, you're less likely to get an overdraft come Jan. 1, Not much less likely, however, but at least if you make a mistake by a few bucks, you won't get creamed for it.

They're going to limit the number of times you can be charged to four, and if you go into the negative by less than $5, you won't get a fee. So if you're a BB&T customer and $5.01 in the hole, I can imagine you're going to have some fun conversations with the manager.



Oh, and here's another change.If you go to their ATM and ask for more money than you have, what an amazing concept -- they'll alert you that you don't have enough to take out without going into overdraft.

And, of course, with the announcement of these new changes came the usual bank blather, where the spokesperson sounds as if this has nothing to do with all of their other rivals changing their policies and consumer anger at banks: "Client satisfaction continues to be our top priority," said a senior executive vice president for deposit services in the BB&T press release announcing the news. "The changes we're announcing today, in addition to tools and services we already provide, will help our clients better manage their deposit accounts."

In case you were wondering, incidentally, BB&T stands for Branch Banking and Trust and is headquartered in Winston-Salem, N.C.