Royal Bank Visa - Removed funds from personal account without knowledge

Complaints.com received the following consumer message on December 10, 2002:

From: Diana [silverbow AT golden.net]

RE: Royal Bank Visa - Removed funds from personal account without knowledge Please forward this message to custrel AT rbc.com, thank you. I have been having trouble paying Visa for several months. First there were expensive car repairs, and then my husband lost his job, so my part-time income was the only one supporting us for awhile. He did find a stop-gap job recently, but has only been working two days and is still in training. Visa was aware of all this, as I spoke with several agents during this period. Some agents were understanding and others couldn't care less. Today I got a call from Visa asking about repayments. I explained to the agent what the problem was, and she was very curt and dismissive. All she cared was that there were "a history of broken promises" and "repayments need to start as soon as possible". She vaguely threatened that my account might be taken to collections. I told her there wasn't anything I could do for her until my husband got his first paycheque, and she ended the call. Later that same day I tried to make a purchase through my debit card, and was told there were insufficent funds in the account. My mother had agreed put in $100 for me through internet banking and she is always reliable, so I was very surprised. When I got to the bank, I found out that she had indeed put in $100 -- and Visa had somehow taken it right back out, leaving my account empty. By the time/date stamp of the printout, I could tell that Visa had withdrawn the money about five minutes after the phone call. The bank was very sorry but they said that Visa can withdraw money from my bank account anytime they please. Is this legal? How can any company withdraw funds from a personal account without permission from the account holder? I certainly don't remember signing anything that gave Visa that authority. And I would have appreciated it if the agent I spoke with had mentioned this as a possibility, or any other agents I spoke with over the last few months. But none of them said anything about this at all! I had to learn from the bank after the fact. And it's not as if I owe Visa a lot of money either, as my balance is less than $3000. So anyone who has Visa through their bank, BE AWARE that Visa can waltz in at any time and withdraw money from your personal accounts. I can't believe this is a standard business practice. People put their money in a bank to be safe, not to make it easy for credit card corporations to take it out without their knowledge or consent. It just seems wrong.