Something has puzzled me ever since Reg E Opt In was implemented. Prior to Opt In, we had both an Insufficient Funds fee and a Courtesy Overdraft Fee (both the same amount). If you overdrew your account and had Overdraft, you were assessed the Overdraft Fee and your items were paid. If you overdrew your account and did not have Overdraft, you were assessed the Insufficient Funds fee and your items were returned. Under Opt In rules, if you opt out of courtesy overdraft completely, can you still be assessed an Insufficient Funds fee?

Yes. The provisions of section 1005.17 only address the assessment of a fee for paying items that take an account negative (or more negative), and for continuing in an overdrawn status due to the payment of those items, when the items are ATM and one-time debit card transactions.

The regulation does not affect a bank's ability to assess a fee for returning an item unpaid, assuming you have appropriately disclosed the fee and the circumstances under which it may be imposed.

ETA: Of course, ATM and one-time debit card transactions can't be returned unpaid, so you can't assess what amounts to an "item returned unpaid" fee. For those card transactions that "sneak in" as overdrafting entries because of $1 authorizations at gas pumps or intervening items get paid first, you won't be able to charge either fee.

Touching on this, if a customer is opted in, and is already negative when a transaction comes in; can additional fees be assessed? I looked through the reg and commentary, but didn't really get a "clear" answer...

any thoughts?

If the customer is opted in under 1005.17 and a card transaction comes in against an already negative balance, you can charge an overdraft fee for the new card transaction.