Deposit delays: Fed tells banks to get customers help

Federal Reserve officials are urging banks to work with customers hurt by ongoing deposit delays that have prevented some people from accessing their paychecks and other funds.

A number of customers still haven’t received their direct deposit paychecks following a “human error” that damaged the plumbing of America’s banking system. The deposit delays are linked to a problem that emerged on Friday with the Automated Clearing House (ACH) payments system, causing headaches for consumers and employers.

“The Federal Reserve encourages banks to work quickly to resolve issues for customers experiencing delays in receiving direct deposit payments as a result of operational issues at a private sector payments provider,” a Fed spokesman told CNN in a statement.

Fed officials signaled they want banks to help customers by waiving overdraft or late fees. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau similarly told CNN on Monday that consumers “should not be penalized” by fees and penalties.

JPMorgan Chase has already said it will waive overdraft fees.

“The Federal Reserve’s payments services are separate and functioned normally,” the Fed spokesperson said on Tuesday.

Banks stressed to customers that all funds are secure. Payments that did not go through late last week had to be resent, a process that can take time.

It’s not clear how widespread the impact continues to be or how long it will take for all customers to receive their deposits.

The Clearing House, the private operator of ACH, told CNN on Monday it is working with banks and the Federal Reserve to “resolve this issue as quickly as possible.” It did not respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.

A Clearing House spokesperson said Monday that the problem started as a “processing error” on Thursday where some ACH payment instructions were sent to financial institutions with account numbers and customers “masked.” That missing data meant that some ACH payments were delayed.

The problem impacted less than 1% of the daily ACH volume in the United States, the Clearing House said. Of course, 1% of a massive system is still a large amount. The ACH Network processed an average of $330 billion per day in September, according to Nacha, a nonprofit that governs the network.

Bank of America and Chase are among the companies where users are reporting problems on Downdetector. Wells Fargo, US Bank, Truist and other banks where users reported problems on Friday ranked lower on Downdetector.

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