SAN ANTONIO—The $738-million Generations FCU has been hit with a potential class-action lawsuit over its overdraft charges, San Antonio Express-News reported.
In the lawsuit Shanika Harrison alleges Generations charged her checking account a fee when it rejected a payment for insufficient funds in the account, and then again each time it reprocessed the transaction, San Antonio Express-News explained.
Harrison offered as an example an $83.12 payment she attempted to make to online lender CreditNinja on Oct. 9. Generations rejected payment because of insufficient funds and charged her a $28 fee, she alleges.
Harrison further alleges that unbeknownst to her, Generations reprocessed the payment and rejected it again on Oct. 23, charging a second $28 fee. Two days later, she says, Generations reprocessed the item and charged her a third $28 fee after it was once again rejected.
“In sum, Defendant charged Plaintiff $84 in fees on an item that Plaintiff only submitted for payment once,” Harrison stated in her complaint. “Reasonable consumers understand any given authorization for payment to be one, singular ‘item’ for a single charge … when the item is submitted for payment by the accountholder only once.”
Harrison is calling Generations’ fee policies and practices “unconscionable and deceptive.”
Harrison is requesting certification of her suit as a class action, saying the class consists of “thousands of members.” She’s suing the credit union for breach of contract, breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, unjust enrichment and violation of the state’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act. She’s seeking more than $1 million in damages, the San Antonio Express-News said.