Ally Bank’s Deposit Agreement Changes - Next Day Transfers

Ally Bank informed customers by email this morning of changes to its deposit agreement that will take effect on December 3, 2016. The email summarized the key changes which include faster ACH transfer speeds and improved funds availability for check deposits. I did a quick review of the new deposit agreement, and I don’t see other significant changes. If you see any, please leave a comment. The changes appear favorable to customers. Below is an excerpt from the email that includes all of the description of the changes. Thanks to DA member Pearlbrown who first posted on this news in the DA forum.

We're updating our Deposit Agreement on 12/03/16 and wanted to let you know about important changes coming soon. We summarized the key changes below, but we encourage you to read the full booklet for details on other updates as well. As always, we're committed to providing you with a better banking experience, so you should take a moment to understand these changes and how they may affect you.

Faster speeds for qualified transfers.

We can now complete qualified transfers between your Ally Bank and non-Ally Bank accounts in 1 business day - free of charge.

If 1-day delivery is unavailable, we'll deliver your transfer in 3 business days.

We'll automatically try to deliver your money faster, but if 1-day delivery is unavailable, it's because:

• Your one-time transfer is ineligible due to account inactivity, overdrafts or transfer returns
• Your transfer is part of a recurring transfer plan

Improved funds availability for check deposits.

We're making more of your deposit available to you sooner – so you have it when you need it.

Starting on 10/01/16, up to $25,000 of your check deposit will be available after 2 business days.

So let's say you deposit a check over $25,000:

• The first $200 will be available the next business day
• Up to $24,800 will be available the 2nd business day
• Remaining amounts over $25,000 will be available on the 5th business day

We may hold all funds up to 5 business days if we believe a check you deposited won't be paid, a check you deposited was returned unpaid or you have repeatedly overdrawn your account in the last 6 months.

For complete details, please review the updated Ally Bank Deposit Agreement (PDF). If you have any questions, free to call us at 1-877-247-2559. We're here 24/7.

The email made it sound like the next day transfers may already be available, but when I checked with Ally, the CSR said “this will not take effect until the date specified.”

Here's the link to the new deposit agreement that's dated December 3, 2016, and here's the link to the current deposit agreement that’s dated December 7, 2013 with changes that are effective as recent as April 28, 2016. Note, the changes since 12/7/13 are noted at the start of the document, but they’re not included in the document. This makes comparison between the two agreements difficult. If you find other significant changes that Ally didn’t mention in the email, please leave a comment.

The new deposit agreement includes a new section on next day transfers including two tables that detail inbound and outbound processing times. It appears next day transfers should be available for most everyone by December 3, 2016. The first paragraph lists some exceptions that go beyond what the email listed. Below is an excerpt of this paragraph followed by the two tables:

Availability of Next Day Transfers. Next Day transfer availability is determined by Ally. Considerations involved in providing Next Day availability include, but are not limited to, account tenure (new accounts), account inactivity, and transfer activity such as overdrafts and ACH returns. For the purpose of account security and fraud prevention, we reserve the right to modify the Next Day qualifications at any time based on, but not limited to, your current and historical use of the transfer service.

Faster ACH transfers will be a nice change. I’m sure many long-time Ally customers will remember when Ally transfers were faster. Transfers slowed down in 2010 after Ally changed their transfer system to Cashedge. So today’s announced change may be considered by long-time customers to be a fix rather than an improvement.