Man, let me tell you, waking up to find your bank account just gone is a gut punch. Seriously, zero warning, nothing. I’ve been banking with these guys—let’s call them “Big Bank”—for over a decade. Had my checking, savings, and even a small line of credit with them. Always paid my bills, never overdrafted. So, when I logged into my app that one morning and saw the dreaded “Account Closed” message, I thought it was some kind of elaborate spam or maybe a glitch.
I immediately called their customer service line. Took me forever to get through the automated maze—you know how that goes—and finally spoke to a human, a guy named Kevin. I was already starting to sweat. I explained the situation, told him my account number, and he just put me on hold. Longest five minutes of my life.
When he came back, the tone had shifted. It was professional, sure, but cold, sterile. He essentially confirmed it: my accounts were permanently closed. I asked, naturally, “Why? What did I do?”
The Runaround and The Real Reason
Kevin was absolutely useless in terms of giving me a straight answer. He kept repeating boilerplate stuff about “internal review” and “compliance decisions.” He mentioned that they were mailing a check for the remaining balance, which, thankfully, wasn’t zero, but still—what about access to my money now?
I didn’t let up. I demanded to speak to a supervisor, and after another agonizing wait, I got Sarah. Sarah was slightly more forthcoming, though still cagey. She hinted that the closure wasn’t due to poor credit or missed payments. It was something else entirely. Something to do with my activity.
My activity? What activity? I’m just a regular dude. I get my paycheck direct deposited, I pay rent, I buy groceries, maybe transfer some money to my buddy when we split dinner. That’s it.
But then I remembered something I started doing about six months prior. I had jumped onto a side hustle flipping collectible sports cards online. I’d buy low on auction sites and sell high on marketplaces like eBay or specialized forums. It wasn’t huge money, maybe an extra grand or two a month, but it was irregular. Lots of small deposits coming in quickly, sometimes from unfamiliar names, sometimes larger chunks when I sold a big rookie card.
I explained this to Sarah. She paused. Then, she dropped the hammer.
“Mr. Johnson, the pattern of frequent, small third-party deposits, particularly those routed through peer-to-peer apps before landing in your checking account, triggered an automated flag for suspicious transactional behavior. Our compliance department has determined that this activity poses an elevated risk for money laundering or unauthorized commercial use, violating the terms of service for a personal checking account.”
The Fallout and What I Learned
Are you kidding me? Flipping baseball cards looked like laundering drug money to these algorithms! It was infuriating. Sarah told me it was an irreversible decision based on their risk assessment model. They didn’t care that I had receipts, eBay transaction logs, and messages proving legitimate sales. The algorithm flagged it, and the human compliance team just rubber-stamped the system.
The check arrived a few days later—a fat envelope containing a paper check for everything I had saved. What a headache. I had to scramble to set up a new account somewhere else, update all my direct deposits, and change every single automated payment linked to Big Bank. Rent, utilities, gym membership—every single one needed sorting out instantly.
The worst part? When I went to open an account at a smaller, local credit union, they asked if I had ever had an account closed involuntarily. Thanks to Big Bank’s knee-jerk reaction, I technically had to say yes. It didn’t stop the credit union from opening the account, thankfully, but it required extra paperwork and a conversation with the branch manager explaining the whole baseball card fiasco.
So, the takeaway is brutal but simple: if you have a side hustle involving frequent or irregular cash flow, especially if it looks commercial, your personal bank might just decide you’re too much trouble. They’d rather lose a long-time customer than deal with the bureaucratic hassle of confirming that your unusual activity is just you trying to make an honest living. Now, all my side hustle money goes through a dedicated third-party payment processor first, keeping the bank deposits clean and predictable. Never letting an algorithm dictate my financial stability again.