Do you ever get the feeling that your bank may be purposefully trying to get you to pay them more in overdraft fees? If so, you are not alone in your suspicions. And, your feeling may very well be grounded in fact.

How Some Banks Manipulate Overdraft Fees

Banks have long been known to practice something called transaction stacking. This entails the bank purposefully processing a given set of debit card transactions you made during a given day's shopping in order from the largest to the smallest transaction - regardless of the order in which the charges were actually made by the customer.

What is the result of this practice? Well, if the your checking account balance at the time of the charges was just a bit too low to cover all of the charges, with transaction stacking there is a much better chance that the account will end up with non-sufficient funds (NSF). This means that you end up paying not just one but multiple overdraft charges in the same day. This could lead to $100 or more in fees in just one day. Ouch!
Want proof that this really happens? On August 11, 2010, a judge's ruling in California, for example, found a major national bank guilty of using creative bookkeeping devices to bilk its customers out of hundreds of millions of dollars in overdraft fees. And that ruling was not just a slap on the wrist, it had teeth: the judge handed down a $203 million fine to the bank.

If you are wondering, "How can I fight overdraft fees?", here are 3 strategies that can help you avoid paying overdraft fees:

#1: Keep a "safety pad" of cash in your account at all times:
The easiest way to avoid overdraft fees is to make sure to keep a padding of at least $150 or so in your checking account at all times. That way, you will have some extra money in the account in case you end up charging too much on a given day's shopping outing. Of course, not everyone of us has the ability to keep such a padding in the account.

#2: Religiously check your balance 2-3 times per day:
Another strategy is to simply be religious about looking at your checking account balance multiple times each day - say morning, noon, and night. That way, with such vigilance, you should be able to keep yourself aware of the latest situation with your account balance. Of course, this requires a lot of work.

#3: Ask your bank to de-activate your overdraft protection:
Another option would be to ask your bank to de-activate your overdraft protection. The only trouble with this option is that you may have to face the embarrassment one day of having your charge rejected at the register in front of friends or neighbors.

Besides these 3 strategies above, here is a bonus strategy for you:
switch to a bank that will cover your overdrawn account charges but will still never charge you an overdraft fee. These banks are out there and they want your business.