Let’s make the Fed require verification before allowing ACH withdrawals from your account. ACH (Automated Clearing House) is a government agency whom processes electronic transactions governed by the Federal Reserve. In order to process ACH transactions a company has to be registered with the Fed. The problem comes in that there is no verification of identifiable information before an ACH withdrawal is done. All a thief needs are your routing number and account number, found on any check. Not comforting.
This is contrary to say using a credit or debit card online which requires that your name, billing address, and security code match up. With ACH there is nothing. Yup, you heard it. As stated earlier, all a company needs are the routing number and check account number to pull any amount of money from your account. View full article »
I know it might sound strange to pay more fees for every swipe of your debit card, but amazingly it is in your best interest. The Federal Reserve is looking at capping debit card transactions fees to 12 cents a swipe as opposed to the industry standard of 44 cents. By imposing cost controls it will result in the dying out of most free checking accounts and the end of the dynamic strength of the market’s ability to adapt. Just so we understand, this fee of 44 cents isn’t directly paid by the consumer, rather it is a fee assessed to the merchant at the time of the transaction. This is very common with all forms of cards.
