Ally

This has to be the worst bank I have ever used in my life. The customer service and tech support are clueless. I called to have a two-step verification setup and customer service after 20 mins reached out to tech support, who gave me a ticket number and advised it would be complete in 10-14 business days. Since I had to wait so long for two-step verf. I decided to stop my online transfer from my regular bank to my new Ally savings account that was due to start the following week. The following week the transfer I stopped and received an email saying it was stopped went through anyway :(. After waiting 3 weeks and still no two-step verf setup by Ally, poor customer service, and the stopped transfer going through anyway I closed my account.

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Ally Bank has frozen my checking & reserves accounts because I clicked on their "link accounts" button on my Ally Bank dashboard. And they won't give back my money.

I received no warning or notices--emailed or USPS mailed--of my account being frozen. The button I clicked did not have instructions, warnings or disclaimers associated with it. The only emails I received were two on the same day that I finally tried to log in again and realized I had no access to my accounts. I called and after getting the runaround several times, providing my ID info every time, spoke with someone in the Fraud Prevention & Loss Dept. They gave little to no information. I provided, at their insistence, detailed proof of my identity, including capitulating to their demand that I provide them with a statement from my primary banking institution. It made no difference. They wouldn't escalate my complaint to corporate/management or provide any contact info for those entities. They wouldn't provide the name of a contact for LPD with whom I could try to resolve the issue. Repeatedly left on hold, repeatedly disconnected. We all know the drill.

My accounts have been frozen for weeks. They will not release my funds, they will not provide me with details, they make it impossible to speak with anyone at their corporate office. They have no brick & mortar branch in my region. I stated that I wanted to close my accounts based on this experience. They would not close my accounts.

I've since read online reports of issues with Ally bank, CFPB and DOJ actions against them, and class action suits, along with BBB and other complaints about their freezing accounts and "stealing" or "holding hostage" money. It simply can't be legal to freeze customers' accounts for trite or arbitrary reasons, without warning or notice, and refuse to refund their deposits indefinitely or even discuss the issue with them to reach resolution.

Background, I deposited a couple thousand dollars in ALLY Bank checking and reserves accounts to try it out. The checking deposit cleared fairly quickly, the reserves acct. Deposit took a ridiculously long time. I never made a withdrawal, wrote a check against the fund, or a debit card transaction with ALLY Bank. I made 3-4 tiny bill pay transactions (amounts less than $2) to test the bill pay system they offer. They all cleared in a reasonable period of time. My account was only about 2 months old when this occurred.

I've filed complaints with the FDIC, my Attorney General's Consumer Complaint Div., the CFPB and now BBB. Additional steps will be taken, not only to recover my funds, but to help prevent this from happening to others.

Last week was my oldest son's 18th birthday - the age at which he can legally open a bank account. Since I am a financial planner, I wanted to send him off into adulthood on the right foot by establishing his own bank account, investment account, and credit card. Our first step was a visit to the Ally Bank website, where I intended to have him establish a money market fund that he may use when he goes off to college in the Fall. Our plan was to then establish an Ally credit card that he could link, along with his bank account, to his newly established Acorns account. I planned to fund the Ally account with a check that he would scan in from his iPhone.

He completed the Ally money market account online in about five minutes and hit the submit button. To our surprise, he received a notice that the account was subject to review and that he would receive a response in 2-3 days. We called customer service to find out if this was normal and were informed that the application was just randomly flagged for review. Okay, so we wait a few days. No big deal.

Yesterday, my son received an email notification with a reference number and instructions to call a toll free Ally customer service number. When we called, the customer service rep advised that there was some information on his application that did not seem accurate, but that he was not authorized to disclose what information was missing or causing the problem. He said that to verify the accuracy of the information on the account, my son must now provide a copy of his driver's license and a copy of his social security card to Ally Bank.

While I have no problem providing a copy of a driver's license to comply with the Patriot Act (most states no longer include social security numbers on driver's licenses), there is absolutely no way my son will be mailing his social security card to Ally Bank or any other financial institution. It is shocking in this day and age that Ally would make such a request. Ally already has my son's social security number on the online application he submitted. Honestly, if we had not just applied on Sunday, I would have thought that this was a phishing scam.

As a postscript, I checked online to see if other users had similar issues with Ally Bank. I have found that there are many applicants who have had the exact same experience. There are also many complaints about Ally being both overly zealous in unnecessarily requesting delivery of applicants' social security numbers and about Ally being careless in the treatment of such extremely sensitive, confidential personal data.

This has indeed been an excellent personal finance learning experience for my son, and for me! Two lessons I am now sharing with everyone - (1) do not do business with companies that request you to provide your social security card via mail or unencrypted email, and (2) AVOID Ally Bank.

It is with a heavy heart that I decide to release myself from being an Ally Bank customer after 10 years. 3 times in 2 months my account was used fraudulently. I purposely blocked my bank card so that NOONE could use it. However, somehow Ally allowed it to be used by someone else, which is ludicrous since I wouldn't have been able to use it myself. Each time I was given a new card...I never used it...but someone else did. What the? They investigated and returned the misused funds but the damage was done. There wasn't a way to keep my money safe there anymore. I did the right things to protect myself but if the controls and alerts aren't working, what else can you do? They have good rates but if your money isn't safe its time to look elsewhere.

U sign up for auto pay and it "accidentally" cancels after a few months. They charge u a late fee and send collections and you don't know about it. When u think it is auto pay, they dnt even check or send u infor when their site screws up. Takes many hours to gt fixed as site takes 3 days to update payments and fixes.

THE GOOD:
I've been an Ally Customer for years - via acquisition first - and then became a "double customer" when they acquired my brokerage. For basically-free, interest-earning checking and savings accounts, they are the best I have found.

THE BAD:
Their website and (especially) their app have bugs and aren't nearly as easy to use as they should be. When I've reported the bugs, they've politely blown me off. Also, the brokerage's clearing firm, Apex, makes mistakes when reporting your taxable activity to to government. I mean, taxes are complicated, but not THAT complicated that their accounting bugs cannot be fixed over a period of years. I've never understood why they can't get it right.

When your minor is no longer a minor, Ally literally doesn't know how to convert the custodial account to a stand-alone account. Two different reps gave me VERY different instructions. I've spent hours on it and gotten nowhere. Apparently, my 18-year-old can open a bank account at any bank on the planet EXCEPT Ally.

THE UGLY:
When I needed to withdraw funds to buy a house, Ally let me down badly. I started trying to wire the money to the title company on Monday morning. Ally Invest won't allow "third party transfers", so I had to wire it to my Ally Bank account. It took fully two days to achieve that step. And from when I requested the wire from Ally Bank to the title company, it took well over 24 hours, even though I had told them of my closing time and asked for anything they could do to help me meet it. They didn't even call to verify the wire until 24 hours after my request. I looked like an idiot at the Thursday closing, because the funds weren't there. I was really embarrassed and am now looking for a new bank.

Another time, I was trying to pay off a loan. Set up a bill payment on the Wells Fargo loan for $50,000 (yes, fifty thousand). Didn't show up for weeks. I called Ally. That's when I learned that they MAILED the payment - seriously - Ally didn't do an electronic transfer TO ANOTHER U.S. BANK; they mailed a fifty thousand dollar check. So I asked them to stop payment on the lost check. They said they had. I sent a new payment. THEN THE "STOPPED" PAYMENT WENT THROUGH, and I had written a FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLAR HOT CHECK because of it. Talked to Ally again, and a "typo" had been made that allowed the supposedly-stopped check to go through. Inexcusable.

Most recently, I bought an auto part - a transmission seal - for my daughter. I went to pay myself back from her savings account. Put in the notes for the transfer, "Advance Auto Parts - rear tranny seal". When I submitted it, Ally threw up an error message: "We've flagged one of the words you used in your response as abusive language. Try again without that word." OMG - I've been offensive toward transmissions without even knowing!

Best case, Ally is incompetent. Worst, they're evil.

I have online banking via Bank of America, and set up monthly payments for Ally, to be paid a day before its due date. Beyond my control, Ally has BoA sending them "check payments."
Then, Ally Lending sticks me with a late fee of $35.00 due to their arrangement with my bank!
I RESENT BEING CHARGED A LATE FEE WHEN THEIR REQUEST HAS BEEN TO THE BANK AS OPPOSED TO ME (the payee)...Once this account is paid in full, I'LL NEVER AGAIN DO BUSINESS WITH THIS LENDING INSTITUTION.