A Michigan retiree who has sued more than three dozen credit unions and banks over the surcharge-fee notification requirements of the Electronic Funds Transfer Act has convinced ELGA CU to settle one suit by paying as much as $76,000 to nonmembers who used six of its ATMs that lacked the mandated external notice of a surcharge.
An estimated 2,269 nonmember cardholders who used one of the six cash machines a total of 2,943 times between April 16, 2009, and Sept. 3, 2009, may be eligible for payments up to $250 each, and Nancy Kinder, of nearby Fowlerville, Mich., who brought the suit, will receive $1,000, ELGA, one of the growing number of credit unions faced with Transfer Act suits, said in court papers detailing the settlement. Cardholders must submit a claim by Aug. 8.
The $275 million credit union is the latest target institution to agree to terms with Kinder. Independent Bank, which operates 40 ATMs in Michigan, agreed earlier this year to pay $350,000 to settle her EFTA claims.
Kinder and her partner Ray Harrison, who fancy themselves as ATM vigilantes, have been driving around the country for the past three years with camera in hand to record ATMs they say are in violation of the 10-year-old act, which requires credit unions and banks to post notices either “on or at the ATM” that non-customers will be assessed a surcharge for withdrawing cash at the machine (
Kinder is the named plaintiff in 28 different suits filed in federal courts in Michigan, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, New Mexico, Arkansas and Indiana over the past three years, with four filed most recently the same day–July 22. She has suits pending against FirstLight Federal Credit Union, Chino Federal Credit Union, White Sands Federal Credit Union, AAC Community Credit Union, Jackson Community Federal Credit Union, Michigan Schools and Government Credit Union, Lenco Credit Union, Jackson County Credit Union and Northwood Credit Union, among others.
