ABOUT ATM/DEBIT CARD DAILY LIMITS: ATM/Debit Cards have a standard daily limit of $500 for purchases and $250 for cash at an ATM during a 24-hour period. These limits can be raised or lowered temporarily as needed. Call during a weekday to have your limits adjusted.
HOW “REAL-TIME” DEBIT CARDS WORK
Our members asked for real time debit cards and we at ACPE have complied. If you have a debit card from ACPE, you have discovered that since March 31 things are different. To better serve our members, debit cards went “real time” on that date. This means that deposits made to an account are immediately available for use through the card; no more having to wait for an upload.
This also means that debit charges against the balance are posted (debited) from the account balance immediately. However, sometimes charges using a debit card are processed as if the card were a credit card. Most times you decide how the charge will be processed, that is, as a debit card or a credit card. Sometimes the merchant makes the decision.
When debit card charges are processed as a credit card transaction, the charge is not immediately posted to the account balance. Instead, the charge is marked as “pending” but the amount has reduced the account’s available balance and, therefore, those funds have been used and are no longer available. This will show up as the difference between your “balance” and your “available balance.” These credit-card-type charges may take as long as two days to actually post against the account balance.
Since federal banking regulations require that these “pending” charges must be paid, that is, not available for “stop payment” or other forms of non-payment, you may overdraw your account while appearing to have a positive balance.
We are all learning new things and we can all learn together. We have two suggestions for our members to help with the account balance and available balance issues. The first is to always run the debit card as a debit whenever possible. This will keep your account balance in line with the available balance more often. The second suggestion is to very, very closely monitor your available balance when making purchases. Keep a register, take receipts every time, and keep a running balance in the register so you always know what you have available.
Sincerely,
Marcia Dent, President
FEE SCHEDULE CHANGES AND CLUB ACCOUNT NOTICE took effect on May 1, 2009. For more information, see Fees and News & Announcements.