NAFCU supports tougher penalties on ACH violations

<p>ARLINGTON, Va – NAFCU has agreed with a NACHA proposal that would impose higher penalties on credit unions and other financial institutions that break the rules governing Automated Clearing House (ACH) transactions. In a February 1 letter NAFCU expressed support for a NACHA proposal that an alleged violating institution get only one warning letter before being brought before a disciplinary panel, but differed with the proposal that would have given the institution only 10 days to respond to the complaint. “A rules violation could possibly take more than ten days to research dues to reasons such as interaction with various other financial institutions and/or accessing old file data,” NAFCU wrote. NAFCU also supported a system of ascending fines that would assess $250, $750 and $1,000 fines for first, second and third recurrence of rules violations. At the fourth rules violation NACHA would assess the violating institution with a $5,000 per month fine, payable until it corrected the problem. NAFCU suggested, however, that if NACHA wanted to impose higher fines it do so on a tiered system based on the financial assets of the offending institution.</p>