Managing Your Account

With banks allowing their customers to do more with their bank accounts, including making standing orders and auto-pay instructions, it is important to keep track of your account balance to ensure your outgoing payments are covered by your deposits so as to avoid overdraft fees and interest charges.

Bounced checks
When you write a check for which you lack the money in your account to cover, the result is an overdraft, or a bounced check. Overdraft fees on bounced checks can be very costly. It is not unusual for someone to miscalculate and bounce a number of checks in a row.

Fortunately, there are some remedies when this happens.

• Overdraft protection. Most banks will offer a line of credit that will kick in when you make a charge that exceeds your balance. Interest is usually payable on these facilities so be sure to pay them off as soon as you can.
• Negotiate. Sometimes a bank will waive an overdraft fee when asked. They usually do so only if the overdraft was a rare occurrence. In other words, if you have a habit of bouncing checks, they are not likely to cut you a break.

Online banking
Most banks now allow customers to monitor their account activities on the Internet, making it easier to track the money going in and out of the accounts. Ask your bank for details of how to register for online services and beware of cyber-security risks – ensure you are accessing your account using a secure network connection to prevent intrusion.