Ally Financial
reviews and complaints

Financial Management Team (Auto),

Checking on the delay of my lease buy for 2019 Alfa Romeo Stelvio; the check was received May 18, 2023. Today is Monday, June 26, 2023 I still have not received any updates. Since my lease is based on interest charged (per day if late) It is only right that you compensate me with "YOU" being late (one month's plus payment) on your behalf for being late. In addition, your department sent me incorrect documents to sign on Tuesday June 6, 2023, for me to obtain the pink slip; why didn't they check the documents before sending it out to me? Time wasted! Your department, Ally Financial as an entity are also unorganized when I called in to inquire about my account, no one seems to know where or how to transfer me. This is not acceptable coming from a reputable company; rated #22 in 2022? If your people are not thorough in paperwork, how do you expect to gain trust from customers? With Ally being an online banking with no physical branches; it is very frustrating trying to contact and dispute issues in a timely manner with Ally Financial.

I urgently am asking for Ally to expedite the packet so that I can obtain the pink slip and to compensate one month's late payment to me.

I paid my ca off, over a year ago and have still not received my Title. I have heard , "it's in the mail", "it has been expedited", "we sent it and you'll receive it in 7-10 days", "You have to fill out a form for duplicate title" but Never received the form, or Title.

I asked them to send the Title, a duplicate, or fax, snail mail the form, or send through their site, the paperwork to get a lost Title, but nothing!

They sent a release letter, but the DMV will not remove them as lien holder without the Title.

Ally Financial auto services does not fulfil their company advertising to help people who really need loan modifications due to extended illness or Covid related issues. After long phone waits, lengthy chat messages, the representatives do not provide alternatives for those who truly need help beyond their automatic system. For example, the chat system asks if you experienced Covid related problems. It doesn't provide any relief. Also, if you have sickness beyond their automatic system's approval they say that it is system generated. But yet, they advertise that they will help you if the online system denies your request, the system alerts you to call. After calling and waiting for several minutes, the representative states that they can't help you because it is system generated. Ally Financial auto services advertise falsely that they help, but they don't. The last representative on June 7, 2023 when I called to revisit their suggested plan because it would result in insufficient funds, said that I should keep the plan to avoid repossession and collection calls. This was alarming because I have communicated with them faithfully and have medical documentations and their promise to help people. After, I shared this with the representatives, he typed back and said that he doesn't see that I'm up for repossession. This is a form of customer taunting and I truly needed temporary assistance until August when my pay would return to normal. Ally Financial is not a real person company that truly works with people.

I am a long time customer and have a long been a fan of ally but the few shortcomings they have a make banking really difficult:
1. Wire transfers. Unlike other banks, their “wire transfers” are not at all instant. It can take days or even a week (like in my case) for a wire transfer to be cleared. That’s longer than a standard ACH transfer and twice was a major issue for me when I closed on a house and I had to wire the down payment. It should take seconds not a week.
2. User interface. Their app and site have actually gotten worse over the years. You know those ads that drop down on a site and you accidentally click it? That happens every time in the app when they “suggest” you try ally investing.

These sound like not a big deal but when you use the bank continuously, you expect at least some features to be standard by this time.

In general: allows you access to your account most of the time and has all the things I need on the go to make transfers and such as needed.

That being said:
- I have registered my Touch ID more often that I can count. This is not normal for it to break with every update you make to the app. Please get that under control. It broke again today which is what prompted me to write this.
- used to be significantly faster on login. I feel you ally with the TradeKing merger, but I really just want to be able to login to my account as fast as possible.
- Random error pop ups on login. I enjoy the pop up that shows up after touch ID but is hidden in an instant (not really)

That being said - loads better than other banking apps I use but please stop breaking Touch ID and /or integrate a password manager retrieval thing like one password or iCloud Keychain

I’ve had an Ally interest checking account since 2015. On February1st I deposited two checks via e check deposit. The second check’s funds were released the next day. The first check (which was well below their limit for special handling and extra hold time for a check) was still pending three days later. I called customer service and the CS representative was very helpful. She found no reason so she contacted at least three supervisors who also couldn’t find a reason. They verified my story and it matched the check. The end result was there was someone up the chain who didn’t give a reason but over rode the decision of the other supervisors and placed a seven day hold on my check. This was a time sensitive transaction and it cost me money. Moral of the story. Supervisors don’t have the final say and if you have a check and need the cash, place it with another bank.

I will be honest and say that the app itself and the features are very good. The layout is awesome, very easy to use, and very few issues for the most part. HOWEVER...there is no point to any of this if you have the worst trading hours and worst banking hours I ever seen! Premarket trading begins at 8?! Post market trading ends at 4:30?! You can only transfer money between ALLY ACCOUNTS M-F 8 to 3:55?! At first this didnt seem like a big issue and I was happy with Ally, but time and time again I have run into situations where these restrictions have hindered me and caused monetary losses or missed opportunities. If not for this, I would put Ally at the top of the list, but it has become such a ridiculous inconvenience. Other companies have much more flexible hours. I will be moving all my money into a different broker until Ally brings their hours of operation into the 21st Century.

System unavailable. All the time, its a mobile bamk, this is unacceptable. Then theres a security code for everything, forever wait on depositing checks, impossible to access funds. Tyey log me out all the time from touch id as well this bank just gets worse and worse, if your a mobile bank at least your app should work. UPDATE : STILL BUSTED.

Then the app developers write me back, "we're sorry for any inconvenience" yea, I'm sorry too. Its amazing how if I were to bounce a check I bet a sorry wouldn't get me very far. Are you actually going to fix all of the flaws? No. You'll simply say sorry, and that's the answer we get. Its a hollow sorry. If you really wanna be sorry every time your app screws up gimme a dollar, bet ud fix it real quick then. Oh look at that, I see I've been logged out again "for security purposes" I'm sure. There are substantially better banks out there. I'd recommend shopping around

I started using Ally for saving and they were fine for that until their rates dropped. Then I tried using Ally for investing and compared to others like eTrade, Robinhood, Fidelity etc… this just isn’t up to par and I’ve been really disappointed with Ally recently, enough to close out positions and move on. It’s not just one thing that disappoints but a combination and it’s similar to most reviews. Clunky interface, slow processing times, wrong tickers etc. all that can end up costing you money. Support is quick, but rather than spend my time to troubleshoot my issues, it was just quicker to move elsewhere, I don’t want to waste my time. I’m not missing out right now on anything Ally provides vs any other bank or trading accounts. Never say never, I may use Ally again but only when there’s a substantial financial incentive (higher savings yields or lower mortgage rates than others) that would compensate but otherwise there’s plenty of better options out there today.

I would avoid this bank at all costs. I was surprised to see multiple $25 overdraft fees posted to my account, with no explanation and no charges associated with them. After calling they turned out to be unauthorized charges in excess of the account balances that were attempted on my account. Ally declined the charges, but still charged me a $25 fee. The unauthorized charges were attempted two additional times, Ally declined them both times, but again charged me $25 two additional times. When I called, they told me that I could not dispute the charges because they were declined and never posted to my account. In addition, they said their policy is to only remove up to $50 of charges, thus telling me I could have to pay the remaining $25 in fees for the charges that were not authorized. I spoke with multiple levels of customer service and they were callous in their response that they would not remove additional fees and that I agreed to them in their deposit agreement.

I opened my account with Ally 12 years ago when it was called Trade King. I bought one stock and I sat on it as it went from 8 dollars down to .50 and back up to 8 dollars.
When I went to check my account this year it was worth $130.
Ally had been selling off my shares to cover their $4 a month statement fee.
This is mostly my fault for thinking I could just buy the shares and forget about them. I could have been more involved. I could have read the fine print.
When I bought my shares in 09, there was no Robin Hood, no robo advisors, no fractional shares. I don’t think I had an iPhone yet. There were few easy avenues for a working class guy like myself to get in to the stock market. I had to save up 4 grand to buy a round lot of shares and have it wired from my bank to trade king.
Today, there are so many apps that will allow you to get in to the market with the smallest buy-in and very ultra low fees.
With so many firms to chose from, I recommend going with one that won’t nickel and dime your investment down to nothing.
And read the fine print.

I moved to Ally Bank on the assumption that an online only bank would have a killer app, but the Ally app is below average at best. One example of missing basic functionality is in the bill pay function. I have payees set up with access to e-bills. I schedule and pay the balance in full prior to the due date, yet after the due date the app lists the bill as overdue and instructs me to log into the full website at Ally.com and manually mark the bill as paid. I am baffled as to why the app can’t perform this simple task. The app has all information needed to update the status correctly. It has the payee, amount due, minimum amount due, date due, date paid and amount paid. A first year programmer could write the code that says if payment is made to the payee that is equal to or greater than the minimum amount due on or before the due date, update status to paid or current. I have written to Ally multiple times about this and get a form response saying the appreciate me reaching out, but they do nothing. This is only one example of simple basic functionality lacking in this app. They have actually rolled out “updates” that took away functionality.

I signed up with pretty high hopes. Overall, my confidence in this bank is already getting low.

I just opened my account less than a week ago, and upon downloading the app and attempting to log in, it freezes. As I continue to press submit after entering my credentials, the app thinks I’ve already gone to the next step and am attempting to enter a security code, which isn’t the case since I’m still on the frozen sign-in screen.

So, since the app thinks I’m entering invalid security codes, it locks me out of my account because of too many attempts and prompts me to call customer service (which at time of writing, has a 15 min wait time).

…..You guys are an internet-only bank. You have a lot to prove to consumers & traditional brick & mortars alike; little problems like this shouldn’t exist. If you guys could invest the extra effort into patching this or more importantly, have your code thoroughly reviewed before release, it would save both you and your customers valuable time! It would also signal that you guys take your role of being exclusively online more seriously. Sloppy and unprofessional.

Now I’m wondering what other oversights in programming logic I’m going to come across here…

I chose Ally over Chime because of their high marks for excellent user experiences with the Ally app. I was excited to try it after opening my checking and savings accounts. I went to log in and it wouldn’t recognize the password I just created. It locked me out after three tries and I was directed to call customer service. She explained it was a problem with the system and she fixed it. I was able to log in with her while we were on the call together.

The second time I tried to log in was the following day and I couldn’t get in then either and had to call customer support. She said it was a problem on their end and it’s fixed now, and I was able to log in with her on the phone. The third and final time I tried to log in and couldn’t , I also discovered that you can’t email or chat unless you are logged in so you have to call. To their credit the wait times are reasonable and they are pretty nice (except customer service rep 3 who said the right words but sounded like she wanted to slam a door in my face ). It’s all good because I decided before I talked to Miss Sunshine that I was going to auto deposit my paycheck elsewhere and I was going to close my account.

If you bill yourself as a great customer experience but deny your customer their ability to access their account unless they call for permission first, I’m not giving you an opportunity to make one red cent off me. My paycheck was set to deposit on Thursday but I changed it on my company’s website. Your tech is crap. I was to receive a code from Optin but didn’t, even after requesting it again. This happened on three occasions. It’s honestly hard to have any level of trust in your bank based on the first three days. Where’s my honeymoon phase?

Called for a payoff quote in April 2020 and then proceeded to pay that amount of $22,700 and then never did get the title but thought I did and then got a letter in May 2023 from ally that was dated April 27, 2023 saying they still have my title and I need to pay $112.14 to get it released. I called them and I now owe $118.00 to get it released. So apparently I was quoted the wrong payoff amount in April 2020 and they didn't inform me until just now that is was incorrect so that they could charge me interest on the unpaid balance for 3 yrs so most likely I only owed like $2.00 back in April 2020 and now it is $112.14 and then increased to $118 by the time I figured out it wasn't a scam letter. They should have sent me a notice in May 2020 on May 2023. My account # [protected] for 2018 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Vin 1C4HJXFG2JW290589 I went ahead and paid the $118 but I believe I should be refunded the amount owed from May 2020 from the amount owed on May 2023

Sincerely Kelly Head, Head Concrete, Inc.

Had a bad check written out to me and I was forced to re open the account.
As I was told everything should open up within 3 business days, I called back on the 3rd day and the back office team was very rude and would not speak in a proper manner, I called back to speak to another team member and she said she would not talk to me or give me any explainations. They tell you one thing and then get ugly when you ask for reconsideration, considering this only happened once, and wasnt up to my knowledge that the account would close.

I had an unlawful repossession of my vehicle by my auto lender. They did not give provide the Cobb Notification letter they are required to send me since they were accepting my late payments. They are Ally financial and have class action law suits against them for this exact issue and also within the state of Minnesota where they paid $780 in settlement due to them not following proper protocol per state laws. I got behind in payments when I was laid off last year, notified them of my lay off, they wouldn’t do any payment arrangement or payment assistance since my loan was so new so when I regained employment I have been paying monthly payment plus additional amount each month to get caught up. They closed my account in February regardless of those payments they had been accepting (without me knowing it until today) and continued taking my payments. Last payment was on 4/17/23 for $900. They repo’d vehicle on 5.7.23 with no Cobb notice sent to me. I would have been able to get completely current with my auto loan within the next 30 days if they would notified me of the repossession action and allowed me to make large payments now and then in two weeks when I get paid again. They are telling me since they closed my account they won’t even allow a payment arrangement to get current and I either pay loan in full or they will sell my vehicle. 

Ally Financial has terrible customer service. I was trying to make a payment over the phone only to be constantly told different things, transferred,put on hold and hung up on. I had to call multiple times over the course of three plus hours. At one point I was transferred over to their payment provider only to be told they were closed. What should have been quick and simple was an absolute disaster. I also could not log in to my account online and was never told why until much later. I was trying to give them money on the agreed upon promise to pay date and they made it as difficult as possible. I will no longer be dealing with them in any way, shape or form except through the mail. Which is equally incompetent. Absolutely terrible and horrendous.

I have had a car loan with Ally since 2017. From then up until now have never had an issue. I actually never had to speak to anyone I did all my payments online and always within the grace period. Never had one late fee. Fast forward to now and why I'm writing this post I filed bankruptcy in Jan and decided to reaffirm this loan as I only have 9 payments left. My attorney explained that once I file I will lose access to pay online and that I will need to call and pay over the phone through a third party called aci or send a check in the mail. Sounds simple enough I called in Feb paid over the phone through aci for a $4 charge never even had to speak to a live person. Now March I call to do the same this time as soon as I enter my account number it says payments can not be made to this account and it forwarded me to a live person. The agent tried to process the payment and got the same error she said Ally is blocking the payment. Then she transferred me to the Ally bankruptcy department. They are HORRIBLE no one knows what they are doing. They kept saying yes no can pay over the phone would transfer me back to the aci department and the same circle happened for 4 days. Finally they got the payment to go through and it was deducted from my bank account and I was given a transaction number. Now the problem is my account is still showing no payment. I call again ask why the payment hasn't posted they say what Payment? Now they can't find the payment and the transaction number does not exist! I go to a manager who insists I show proof of this so I call my bank on three way and my bank confirms yes there was a payment made to aci ally and confirmed date and amount. And gave ally there transaction id. We hang up with my bank and the manager says to give him 24 hrs. Which that turned into another 2 days. I call him and he couldn't figure this out and wanted me to start all over calling aci now? I was very frustrated called my bank and disputed the charge since it was 9 days and they still couldn't find the payment they took. I got my money returned hrs later. And sent a check in the mail to ally payment processing center in Kentucky. I sent it on a fri and it was cashed and applied to my ally account by Sat. I was so Happy! So after 3 wks of dealing with this I sent my check right away for April on March 31'st. I called the week of April 10th to see if they got it. They said it can take 7-10 business days. So I waited then called again on the 17th. They said no we have not received it. They said what address did you send it to. I said the same one I did last month the one in Kentucky. They said that's wrong it needs to go to one in Arizona. Which makes no sense since they cashed it last month with the Kentucky address? So I say fine I'll send another to the other address. Which I did that same night. Surprise Surprise next day they cashed the one sent to Kentucky! AND ITS NOT POSTED TO MY ACCOUNT AGAIN! I call AGAIN they say we show no check get all the info. And once again tell me to call in two days. What kind of company takes money and CAN'T FIND IT! And now there is another check in the mail. I have filed a claim with the BBB. The Ally bankruptcy department is awful! None of the customer service agents knows what's going on. All I'm trying to do is pay my bill like I have always done. If you file bankruptcy I would recommended surrendering your vehicle.

If I could choose a negative rating I would! I invested in CD accounts with Ally because they are a large bank with really good rates. On March 15 I closed a 6 figure CD and asked for the funds to be dispersed in two other CDs and gave the amounts for each. Ally created two CD accounts but never funded them. After many phone calls, case numbers and the run around they funded only one account with all of the money. Clearly not what I asked for. I made more phone calls, spoke to several supervisors who assured me they would rectify it, more case numbers and more supervisors but no resolution.

Fast forward and what Ally did was cancel the CD which had the total amount and create a checking account to deposit the funds into. They then said they would create two new CDs and fund those properly. After more supervisors. Case numbers and their famous line of “waiting for approval from the back office, check back in 2 days” the 2 accounts were properly funded. But wait… they penalized me over $800 for closing the CD early that THEY created and funded incorrectly! So now more Case Numbers, more supervisors, more back office excuses and I am told they acknowledge the error on their part and will refund the funds. This was on 3/31.

So guess what… you guessed it several more calls, more supervisors, more case numbers and more blaming the back office and as of today 4/16 I still have not received the funds that Ally in essence STOLE from me.

I was told today they there are no supervisors available and “the back office is waiting on approval, call back Tuesday”

They then had the nerve if they could help me with anymore backing needs! I laughed out loud. Once my CDs have matured I will NEVER bank with Ally again. I would rather have a lower percentage yield on my money than have to deal with the incompetence I have dealt with in the last month.