Terms and Conditions Overdraft Addendum

 
Generally. This Addendum is part of the Terms and Conditions of Your Account. The information in this Addendum is being provided to help you understand what happens if your account is overdrawn. Understanding the concepts of overdrafts and nonsufficient funds (NSF) is important and can help you avoid being assessed fees or charges. This section also provides contractual terms relating to overdrafts and NSF transactions.
 
An overdrawn account will typically result in you being charged an overdraft fee or an NSF fee. Generally, an overdraft occurs when there is not enough money in your account to pay for a transaction, but we pay (or cover) the transaction anyway. An NSF transaction is slightly different. In an NSF transaction, we do not cover the transaction. Instead, the transaction is rejected and the item or requested payment is returned. In either situation, we can charge you a fee.
 

• If you use our Overdraft Privilege and we cover a transaction for which there is not enough money in your account to pay, we will consider that an overdraft. We treat all other transactions for which there is not enough money in your account as an NSF transaction, regardless of whether we cover the transaction or the transaction is rejected.

 
Determining Your Available Balance. We use the "available balance" method to determine whether your account is overdrawn, that is, whether there is enough money in your account to pay for a transaction. Importantly, your "available" balance may not be the same as your account's "actual" balance. This means an overdraft or an NSF transaction could occur regardless of your account's actual balance.
Your account's actual balance (sometimes called the ledger balance) only includes transactions that have settled up to that point in time, that is, transactions (deposits and payments) that have posted to your account. The actual balance does not include outstanding transactions (such as checks that have not yet cleared and electronic transactions that have been authorized but which are still pending). The balance on your periodic statement is the ledger balance for your account as of the statement date.
As the name implies, your available balance is calculated based on the money "available'' in your account to make payments. In other words, the available balance takes ACH credit transactions and debit card transactions that have been authorized, but not yet settled, and adds or subtracts them from the actual balance. In addition, when calculating your available balance, any "holds" placed on deposits that have not yet cleared are also subtracted from the actual balance.
For more information on how holds placed on funds in your account can impact your available balance, read the subsection titled “A Temporary Debit Authorization Hold Affects Your Account Balance."
 
Overdrafts. You understand that we may, at our discretion, honor withdrawal requests that overdraw your account. However, the fact that we may honor withdrawal requests that overdraw the account balance does not obligate us to do so later. So you can NOT rely on us to pay overdrafts on your account regardless of how frequently or under what circumstances we have paid overdrafts on your account in the past. We can change our practice of paying, or not paying, discretionary overdrafts on your account without notice to you. You can ask us if we have other account services that might be available to you where we commit to paying overdrafts under certain circumstances, such as an overdraft protection line-of-credit or a plan to sweep funds from another account you have with us. You agree that we may charge fees for overdrafts. We may use subsequent deposits, including direct deposits of social security or other government benefits, to cover such overdrafts and overdraft fees.
 

• For consumer accounts, we will not charge fees for overdrafts caused by ATM withdrawals or one-time (sometimes referred to as "everyday") debit card transactions if you have not opted-in to that service.

 
Payment Types. Some, but not necessarily all, of the ways you can access the funds in your account include debit card transactions, automated clearing house (ACH) transactions, and check transactions. All these payment types can use different processing systems and some may; take more or less time to post. This information is important for a number of reasons. For example, keeping track of the checks you write and the timing of the preauthorized payments you set up will help you to know what other transactions might still post against your account.
 

• For information about how and when we process these different payment types, see the "Payment Order of Items" section below.

 
Important Information Regarding "Decoupled" Cards. Decoupled debit cards are debit cards offered or issued by an institution or merchant other than us. As part of the issuing process, you provide the decoupled debit card issuer with the information it needs to link the decoupled debit card to your account with us. Once this is done, you can typically use the decoupled debit card as you would any other debit card. Importantly, however, while transactions initiated with these decoupled debit cards ma; originate as debit card transactions paid by the card issuer, we receive and process them as ACH transactions. Additionally, you need to refer to your agreement with the decoupled debit card issuer to understand the terms of use for that card. Thus, when our documentation refers to "debit cards," "everyday; debit card transactions," or "one-time debit card transactions," we are referring to debit cards issued by us, not decoupled debit cards issued by other institutions or merchants. Different payment types can use different processing systems and some may; take more or less time to post. Knowing which card you are using and how the transaction is processed can help you manage your finances, including helping you to avoid overdraft or NSF fees.
 
Balance Information. Keeping track of your balance is important. You can review your balance in a number of ways including reviewing your periodic statement, reviewing your balance online or on the app, accessing your account information by TeleBanc, calling our Customer Assistance Call Center at 540-951-6234 or 800-552-4123, or coming into one of our branches.
 
Funds Availability. Knowing when funds you deposit will be made available for withdrawal is another important concept that can help you avoid being assessed fees or charges. Please see our funds availability disclosure for information on when different types of deposits will be made available for withdrawal. For those accounts to which our funds availability policy disclosure does not apply, you can ask us when you make a deposit when those funds will be made available for withdrawal. An item may be returned after the funds from the deposit of that item are made available for withdrawal. In that case, we will reverse the credit of the item. We may determine the amount of available funds in your account for the purpose of deciding whether to return an item for insufficient funds at any time between the times we receive the item and when we return the item or send a notice in lieu of return. We need only make one determination, but if we choose to make a subsequent determination, the account balance at the subsequent time will determine whether there are insufficient available funds.
 
A Temporary Debit Authorization Hold Affects Your Account Balance. On, debit card purchases, merchants may request a temporary hold on your account for a specified sum of money when the merchant does not know the exact amount of the purchase at the time the card is authorized. The amount of the temporary hold may be more than the actual amount of your purchase. Some common transactions where this occurs involve purchases of gasoline, hotel rooms, or meals at restaurants. When this happens, our processing system cannot determine that the amount of the hold exceeds the actual amount of your purchase. This temporary hold, and the amount charged to your account, will eventually be adjusted to the actual amount of your purchase, but it could be three calendar days, or even longer in some cases, before the adjustment is made. Until the adjustment is made, the amount of funds in your account available for other transactions will be reduced by the amount of the temporary hold. If one or more transactions are presented for payment in an amount greater than the funds left after the deduction of the temporary hold amount, you will be charged an NSF or overdraft fee according to our NSF or overdraft fee policy, which may result in one or more overdraft or NSF fees. You will be charged the fee even if you would have had sufficient funds in your account if the amount of the hold had been equal to the amount of your purchase.
 
Payment Order of Items. The order in which items are paid is important if there is not enough money in your account to pay all of the items that are presented. The payment order can affect the number of items overdrawn or returned unpaid and the amount of the fees you may have to pay. To assist you in managing your account, we are providing you with the following information regarding how we process those items. We encourage you to make careful records and practice good account management. This will help you to avoid creating items without sufficient funds and potentially incurring the resulting fees.
 
Our policy is: We generally post items in the following order: 1) credits, 2) ATM and POS/debit card transactions (low to high dollar amount), 3) ACH debits (low to high dollar amount), and 4) checks (low to high dollar amount); however, exceptions will occur. We may pay other withdrawals or debit items (such as charges) prior to paying any checks, and we may post those other withdrawals or debit items in any order we may choose at our sole discretion.

Learn more about our accounts:
Rates & Fees | Account Disclosure | Terms & Conditions | Overdraft Coverage | Overdraft Addendum | Electronic Funds Disclosure