Albert
reviews and complaints

I opened an account with Albert. I should have read the reviews first not just after I open the account. They randomly steal money from your account. This money that they steal you do not see it in the Albert account. They are unauthorized charges. I tried to close the account out with Albert and they would not let me. It was impossible. I could not email or call. I called my bank and disputed the charges. I reported it as fraud to the bank. They closed out my account and open a new bank account and refunded my money. The next month they went into my bank account and tried to hit it multiple times, and they succeeded by using the old debit card that was attached to the original bank account. After seeing how they did it, they canceled the debit card and an issue out the new debit card so they can no longer get back into my bank account. My dispute was credited back to me again. Do not open up a bank account with Albert. They will randomly steal your money.. there is no way to reach them. Albert financial is a total scam. Please be aware. After closing the account, they continue to try to get me to login with my new banking account information so they can still again. They keep telling me I have earned some more money in my account. The only way to check is to give them your new banking. Will not do.

This company is a scam. I had to leverage my entire social media following unanimously writing negative reviews as well as all my friends writing negative reviews over text with "customer service." This company takes your money without asking. Behold as your hard earned money just disappears from your account without warning. Stay away from this company at all costs.

Any positive reviews are fraudulent! This company scams people out of money by using “we couldn’t verify your identity crap”! Do not listen to to statement on the first page ALBERT IS NOT TRUST WORTHY! THEY STEAL!

File a formal complaint with https://www.consumerfinance.gov/data-research/prepaid-accounts/search-agreements/detail/231465/

Also file with BBB although they’re not registered with them, imagine that!

I can see from the reviews that many others have fallen victim to the same situation I found myself in after downloading this app.

I downloaded this app 5 months ago attempting to get better at budgeting. The app asks for very personal bank account and loan information and even has access to your checking account and takes it upon itself to move your money for you.
Within the first week of downloading I noticed Albert moving way bigger amounts of money than I was comfortable with out of my bank account (this was daily) and into the “rainy day fund” which is only accessible through the app - not into my savings account which would make more sense.

This made me very uneasy, so I moved the money back into my checking account, deactivated all services from Albert, and deleted the app from my phone.

This week I was just casually checking my bank account activity and noticed a $5.00 charge from Albert. I kept scrolling and realized Albert had been charging me $5.00/mo since February.

I redownloaded the app and discovered that all my bank accounts were still connected to this app. I had to google how to completely delete the account and that option was only available under the “help” option in the settings of the app which is not obviously apparent.

I contacted the support team and they informed me that I was not entitled to a refund.

I highly regret downloading this app. I do not remember selecting an option for a monthly payment for these services, but even if I had the app should have been more transparent about the fact that you are still charged regardless of if you have deactivated all Albert services and uninstalled the app. I’m sure this is done purposely. I feel very uneasy about the fact that Albert now has access to a lot of my personal banking information and I will be checking my accounts regularly to make sure there are no further charges.

TL;DR Don’t download this app. They will have access to your banking info and will charge you even after deactivating services.

I heard about Albert a few weeks ago and tried to sign up for an account. After sharing my bank info with them through Plaid, I got a message on screen that they could not verify my identity and I was never able to create an account to even get into the app. After a few attempts, I gave up and moved on. Today I got a strange text from Albert saying I spent a certain amount at one of my favorite places over the last 3 months. I thought that was odd since they said they could not verify my identity and I have not heard from them since trying to create an account over a month ago. Later today I checked my bank account and I have a $120 charge from Albert! I tried to log in to their app/site to figure out why in the world I’m being charged $120… but I don’t have an account with Albert so can’t even find out what they’re charging me for. After doing some research online it seems they are doing this pretty consistently and what apparently used to be a good app has turned into a scam. There is no way to chat or call and speak with a person to have your money refunded, and no way to log in to find out what they’re charging you for. They tell you to text, but when I texted I got this response “The keyword you specified was not recognized.” I have reported this charge as fraud to my bank and they are reversing it. I have also removed Albert’s access to my bank account so they cannot make further charges, because other reviews said they will continue making charges and people have had to close their bank accounts just to make the charges stop. Please read the RECENT reviews as the ones from 4 years ago or even one year ago no longer apply. It looks like a lot of positive (fake) one-sentence reviews have been added lately as well, so skip over those and read the ones that actually detail people’s experience with this app. It’s a true scam and I wasted a huge amount of time today dealing with this. Hope someone files a class action lawsuit against this company because what they’re doing is illegal.

This bank PLAYS WITH YOUR MONEY. I’ve had my account open for about 2 months. My first problem was depositing a check, which I got a notification that it would be posted to my account in 3 days, 3 days came and no check so I reached out to customer service (which they don’t have a number to call btw) when I reached out they told me it would be 7 days. 7 days passed and still no money. Reached out again and was told the actual wait time is 10 days. 10 days passed and still no check. Again I reached out and they told me they have no control over my deposit and that it’ll come when it comes. They didn’t know when it would show up and had no information as to why it was being delayed. 2 weeks later my check was finally deposited but than my direct deposit was late because of this. When I reached out for my direct deposit they told me it was my employers fault because they didn’t release the pay stubs in time which is a lie because everyone else at my job got paid on time. After not leaving them alone and arguing back and forth for 3 hours my check randomly showed up in the middle of the day after being told it would be late because of my employer. And now yesterday someone has hacked into my bank account and has been spending money. The customer service for Albert told me there was nothing they could do and I have to call the merchant for my money back as well as replace my card. Funny thing I JUST replaced my card this morning (1/20) because someone had been trying to use my card all night and got nothing out of it, so when asking them if they’re going to get me a new account/routing number since obviously the card isn’t the problem, I just replaced my card this morning and not even 4 hours later someone is spending money they tell me again to contact the merchant because it’s nothing they can do. DO NOT BANK WITH THEM ITS NOT WORTH IT. YOU DONT EVEN GET THE ADVANCE AND YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN YOUR MONEY IS COMING. This is the worst bank literally in the world and they should not be able to be open as a bank.

Reading all of the negative reviews makes me think that many people are skipping through the initial setup process without reading. I see many complaints that the app won’t let you do anything until you connect your bank account... that’s because it’s a finance app! Of course you need to connect your bank so that it can show you an accurate breakdown of the funds you have in your account, where you’re spending, your monthly bills and expenses, etc. I use many highly rated finance apps like this one and it’s very safe and encrypted, I have never felt worried about giving them my information. I see some are also angry about the automatic withdrawals of money, but this is a main feature of the app that it puts money away to save in a place that’s less accessible than a savings account so that you won’t be tempted to overspend. You can easily turn the automatic saving off if you do not like it! But I think everyone should use it, you’d be surprised at how quickly it adds up. And finally, I saw complains about the fee: from what I understand, if you do not want to pay a monthly fee you can select to pay $0 when you are setting up your account, but in order to be able to use the genius feature where you can chat with a real person, you have to contribute something. They allow you to select an amount to pay that you feel is fair, which I think is very reasonable. When you use Albert you are utilizing services from real people, who have jobs and need to be paid to continue providing that service. I personally have no problem paying $5 a month to support an app that is saving me hundreds. I have been using this app for only a short time and it’s helping me to get my budgeting on track and stop overspending on unnecessary things. I don’t suggest using this app if you will not take the time to read about how it works and what it has to offer. But, if you are looking to save money and keep track of your finances, this is a great one to use. I personally think that this app is awesome and have no complaints so far! Would highly recommend.

This is the most dangerous place to put your money in my opinion. I have been a long time albert customer. I enjoyed the concept of getting paid a couple days early so I set up direct deposit. BIG MISTAKE. My card would get flagged for security risk for every purchase. Basically every time you buy anything your card gets declined and you get a text asking if the purchase was from you. You then have to reply “yes” and then ask the place your buying something from to please run your card again. (I can’t tell you how dumb I’ve look getting my card declined at dinner) As if that wasn’t enough there is little to no way of communicating your issues to them. In order to get help you have to text the bank and wait anywhere from 10 minutes to 3 days for a response. There have been times where I couldn’t access any of my money and went over 2 days in the middle of the week to get a generic response that did not create a solution to my concerns or issues. Fast forward to 2/01/22 my card is being declined and the bank is not allowing me make any purchases. I had to wait 1 day for a response to be told to report my card defective (which I did.) and they told me I would be able to use a virtual card for now. Well the virtual card is not working and they had the majority of my money. Had I not had a separate checking and savings account with a different bank I would not have been able to purchase any necessities. I have messaged Albert over 96 times and still have not gotten a response to a solution or even a reason as to why they did this. I have since then wired all of my money to a new bank, still to this day I am waiting for a response. I will be updating this review with a link to some of the ridiculous responses that they have given me. I will also be attaching the Phone#, Social media accounts and emails addresses for the founder (Andrzej Baraniak) as well as the CFO and any other operations employees that I can find that are made public. (just takes a little research) that way anyone who has felt as helpless as me can reach out to them personally for complaints . Maybe that will make them put the interest of their customers first.

It’s funny how my previous critical review magically disappeared, but I will take the time AGAIN to warn others about this scam. Albert first of all cannot even manage to verify a bank account properly so I would be very wary of letting it handle my finances. To even set up an account with Albert, they force you to sign up for their ‘Genius’ service. There is no way to skip or decline this as it is part of the account creation process. Then of course they ask you to give them you login information for your bank account.

Even though it had my login credentials it was stuck on “trying to verify my bank account” for two days. I know the app successfully accessed my account because I got two notifications from Bank of America warning me about possible fraudulent activity from Albert.

I’m generally reluctant to give my account info to an app but if I hadn’t been in a bind and desperate for a few bucks for gas until payday, I wouldn’t have done that at all. While it was waiting for this [censored]ic app to verify my account it told me that my account balance was too low to verify which was wrong. I had a positive balance and I didn’t find out until today that Albert had taken money out without my consent. Usually when it comes to account verification, other services will deposit a few cent of THEIR money and then take it back. Albert will just take your money and not give it back.

When they finally denied me the instant cash advance all of the reasons they gave me were false. It said I needed two paychecks that were over $400. All of my paychecks are over $400. It also said that my checks aren’t deposited on a reliable date. My paychecks always deposit on Wednesdays. Then it said I needed to make over $1000 a month. I’d be living in a cardboard box if I didn’t. They need to fix whatever algorithm they use to analyze people’s bank data because it was so far off it was ridiculous.

Anyway the app is terrible, not helpful and their advertisements are straight up lies. There are other apps that actually delivers when it comes to fast cash when you’re in a jam. Albert does NOT. Deleting this garbage now and filing a claim with BOA to get the money that Albert took, back.

Honestly, I grew up in a financially illiterate family. I spent much of my young adulthood getting into deeper and deeper debt until I got to the point where I couldn’t imagine a future without massive debt and have never thought the possibility of having a savings account was realistic.

I decided to look into Albert and took the plunge even though it was scary and unknown territory. I’m so happy I did. They helped me in 3 major ways:

1. They gave me clear, beginner-friendly advice to manage my massive credit card debt. I refinanced using a personal loan and I’m now paying half as much every month at a much lower interest rate. I finally have a clear timeline on when my debt will be paid off rather than seeing no dent in my total despite paying outrageous amounts of money every month.

2. They helped me have clear-cut insight into where my money is going and helped me make tweaks in how I use my money. Sure, I still spend way too much on eating out and coffee shops. But, I’ve also made changes because of the insight I’ve gathered from this app. I feel much more empowered.

3. They make saving money possible. They auto-save money for you, if you would like. And they do it in a sustainable and painless manner. They just analyze your spending and auto-save whatever you can spare. Some days it’s nothing, other days it’s a good amount. In 7 months I have created a savings account that is double the amount that I’ve ever managed to save on my own despite years of trying. I’ve also been able to keep my savings account stable and growing rather than pulling from it every other week because I miscalculated how much I could save on my own like I was doing before. It’s been such a life-changer. I was even able to afford a massive unexpected medical bill due to my new savings account rather than going further into debt. They also have an option to invest money, which I have experimented with in small amounts and am really enjoying.

Long story short: I finally feel in control of my finances and can finally KNOW I’ll be out of debt in the next 5 years rather than spending the next 10 years struggling and guessing like I have been for so long.

So, thank you Albert! Please don’t ever go away. I rely on you, now!

So upon downloading the app they have you go through a verification process you provide all the information that you need tracking information what type of goals that you want to accomplish with using their service but you also have to verify your identity so naturally you provide your Social Security number which I know mine and then it has you are required to take a photo of your drivers license front and back now I went through this process about three times before the system locked me out and the application says that I was not able to be verified that I needed to contact the genius which when starting the application it automatically had me create a contact for them which I thought was pretty nifty however when contacting them this is the response that I got “ Hi Alex — I'm the genius that'll be helping you. Give me a few minutes to look into this and I’ll get right back to you. “ “ After reviewing the information you provided, we could not verify your identity. Unfortunately, you won't be able to open an Albert account.

We apologize for the inconvenience. “They provided no insight to why I couldn’t be verified but only stated that I couldn’t be verified which means that I’m not allowed to open an account with them so I guess I won’t be using this service I commend them on their customer service availability from someone who has experience with customer service for about six years now I find it redundant to repeat the same information that has been told to me from both the application and the representative and then just blatantly tell me I’m sorry about your luck you can’t be with us I did receive one final message which I thought was funny this is what they had to say. “ Our partner that handles the verification process does not provide us with information on why the verification failed, and we unfortunately have no way to manually force verification. Sorry for the inconvenience.” So with that being said someone else handles the verification for process and does not provide them the information so they have no manual way to force verification they did not provide any type of timeline resolution or any understanding of how to do verification over again i’m gonna leave this up to logistics problem which means that they have a very bad way of confirming identity not a good app

I started because I wanted the cash advance. You can’t do anything on the app until you go through a multitude of screens. Several pertain to signing up for their Genius program and setting up automatic savings. You can’t skip these. I tried everything. You are forced to enroll in the paid Genius program and the minimum automatic savings is $1.

It promises you that your first 30 days of Genius is free and that you can cancel at any time. That’s an outright lie. Sure, you can cancel, but not when you have a balance or pending balance with them and it can take up to seven days for a balance to clear.

So, what happens is that, at the end of your cycle, the bare minimum savings you’ll have is $2 that they’ve withdrawn from your external account. You can’t cancel Genius because of this savings. If you transfer the money back to your account, you still have to wait a week for it to stop pending before you can actually cancel Genius.

Unless you have the foresight to dig through all the settings (and why would you if you’ve never used it?), there’s absolutely no way for you to end the forced subscription in time and avoid being charged. I literally made myself a calendar reminder at signup so I’d go figure out how to cancel a few days before renewal and that wasn’t enough because of the savings issue.

Adding to this, Albert doesn’t work particularly well if you’re paid by multiple parties. For instance, I have a main job and a couple of side jobs. The main job’s deposit is substantial and twice a month. The side jobs I have to cover recurring medical bills and they pay weekly. Albert treats the very small deposits like a regular payday, so I don’t get very much time to pay back and it almost wipes out that deposit. That makes it much harder to recover. It should be taking from my actual payday. Also worth noting that these odd little paydays seem to make it look like I earn less than I do, so I don’t get advanced as much as I otherwise would.

Yes, you can get a very small interest-free advance from them, but you pay $6-7 to get it right away and they want a tip on top of it and you’re almost guaranteed to loose anywhere from $30 to more than $100 if you don’t cancel that paid service early in your free trial.

I have used similar apps. This one is by far the most misleading and has the lowest advance rates. It’s ok if your desperate but otherwise I wouldn’t bother.

So The only thing great about Albert is their pay advance feature. That has helped me out me a couple times. But man, every other feature is a headache.

So Albert offers a debit card. They are not a bank but that doesn’t matter much. But with a debit card, like other apps that offer this, you expect several convenient features. And on the outside looking in what they offer looks appealing. Pay Advance, investing, savings, cash back. Sounds great, right? Well this is what convenient looks like with Albert…

If you want to put money on your account you can only do that by transferring money from your reg bank account or direct deposit. No cash or check deposits. Ok so for me that’s not a deal breaker but I when I transfer money from my bank it takes forever. For example, I made a $200 deposit on January 13, it says it will not be available until January 24. And the money was already processed and taken out of my bank account on Jan 14th. I don’t know about you, but I kind of need my money. Waiting 11 days is ridiculous. Most other money apps allow instant transfers with your regular banks debit card… Otherwise you will be waiting at most about 2 business days. But 11?! Come on now, it isn’t 2010. And I’m not really in to assigning my direct deposit to an app that isn’t a bank. Who cares about 2 days early. And that isn’t a guarantee. They say that bec the money will be deposited once your employer submits it. And there is no guarantee payroll will submit your payment by tues or wed if your supposed to get paid on Friday. Anyways, continuing on… The investing feature… only a few years ago if you wanted to invest and make trades you needed a broker. Now you can be in complete control of losing all your money. Lol I’m kidding, but I love to buy and trade and sell stocks. But straight up, this is not the app you should be using to invest. I like minimal interfaces but not when it comes to trading stokes and building portfolios. And more importantly Do Not expect anything to be instant here like it is for cash app or Robinhood. Once you sell, you’ll be probably waiting up to a week to get your funds.

So these are my top issues. And writing this out was just as much of a headache as using Albert for anything else other than their pay advance. But hope this helps all you potential users gain some insight, as well as the help the developers in some shape or form. Good luck. Cheers!

Stay away from this app. They are crooks and shady! Also when signing up don’t agree to pay for anything, I promise you will regret it. Don’t link your main bank account use either a secondary account or use a prepaid card banking account. I hate this company and wish I had never gotten involved with them!
I first got involved with Albert a year ago, yes my nightmare started a year ago. About 6 months ago I noticed a small charge in my bank account for only a couple of dollars one day and was very confused as to what it was. After further investigation it came back as “Albert”. I was panicked because I had no idea who or what Albert was. So I did some googling and found the source. Still confused I went through my previously downloaded apps and discovered that I had in fact downloaded it about 5 months prior. Still confused and curious I redone loaded it and went through the option of covering my account. Well that do you know I had over $300 dollars in the account. I’m sorry but what the f***?!?! So I finished setting it back up and then drained all of it from the account. Albert had been taking small amount from my account even after I closed and deleted it. I originally signed up and agreed to pay $7 a month. Well what they don’t tell you is that they are going to charge you the full yearly amount, not monthly. So when reactivating my account they took it upon them selves to charge me $77 dollars. Uh my account isn’t more than 5 months old why am I being recharged for something I already hadpreviously paid for? To make this long horrible f+*** up story short. They over drafted my account not once but 3 times! My bank account that I’ve had for 10+ years is not permanently closed because of the $77x3 they have taken out and all my over draft fees 35x3 plus the return check fees of $30x3, and those are just the charges for Albert. I had other bills and things linked to that account that also tried taking money out, yup over draft and return checking fees for those as well. Albert is still trying to take money from my account (that’s now closed) even after I’ve deleted it and sent them multiple messages to close to account and delete my info. This company is crooked and evil and will take everything they can for you. Don’t use them. Go some where else. Im a pre law student in San Diego ca and I will filing a law suit against them so if anyone would like to join in let me know. You are a horrible company Albert and I hope I can serve justice to you for all my self and everyone else you have screwed over.

I would not recommend this app to anyone that has a local bank since Albert may stop supporting that bank which will cause account issues. When I originally created my account a few years ago, I figured I’d let the Smart Savings feature do its thing and be able to save within the app. I linked my local bank just fine. After a few months I forgot I had the app. Recently I went to check it and found a nice chunk of money in Albert Savings, then decided I was ready to transfer to my bank account and close my Albert account. It’s important to note here that at some point, Albert stopped supporting my local bank which stopped the Smart Savings feature. Not a huge issue since I already had a good chunk of savings. But now, there is a newer version of my bank supported by Albert (my local bank never upgraded so it is my understanding that this was an Albert-specific upgrade in the app) and my old connected account no longer works. I linked my same account and verified it but it is not the “primary account” linked to my Albert savings so I am unable to transfer any money to it despite it being the same account number as the “primary account”. I followed the Support instructions on the app for switching primary accounts but the “change linked account” button is nonexistent in my app. I attempted to delete the primary account and am not able to because it is not verified, yet I cannot verify or update it because it is read as “unsupported” by Albert. So for the past week I have been going in circles trying to verify the new account and trying every option in the app to get rid of the unsupported account. Nothing has worked and after reading some of the other recent reviews I am wondering if I will ever be able to get my money transferred. I was able to successfully get ahold of support once this week so I am hoping that I will be able to get ahold of them again and be able to fix this issue for good so I can delete my account. If they are not able to delete the unsupported account themselves, I am not going to be able to get my money from the account without opening an “Albert Cash” account (aka getting an Albert debit card). I would not recommend this app for anyone with a local bank since there is definitely a risk that this will happen for other local banks and they will become “unsupported” in the app. I am not sure whether this is an issue for larger national banks but I have read about a variety of issues receiving money from the app on various sites so I would strongly recommend checking reviews before creating an account.

I should of read the other reviews before downloading this app, their responses show they don’t actually read what you’re saying.

I recently found out my employer was changing our paydays from Wednesday to Thursday, as soon as I found this out I contacted the text number Albert supplies, since I had used the instant cash function that week. I let them know my payday had change and what the day was going to be and the date, they said “no problem we’ll manually change the payback date for you” okay, problem solved, right? Wrong.

So Thursday hits and they take their money, I let them know in advance so everything should be good. Nope, they blocked me from using instant cash for four days, then after those four days they lowered my withdrawal amount from $75 down to $35 which is lower than what they even start you at. As soon as you sign up they let you take out $50. So it’s clear I was penalized for a “late payment”. Fine, whatever I guess I’ll just withdrawal some so I can build the amount back up, right? Nope. They STILL had my repayment set to Wednesday instead of Thursday. So I would of gotten another penalty if I withdrew again.

So I contact customer support again, I go “hey! Last week I informed your team I get payed on Thursdays now. I went to withdrawal from instant cash and it’s still saying I’ll have to repay on Wednesday. Obviously that will be a problem. How can we fix this?”

They say “no problem, what date do you need it changed to?”

Um, did they even read my message? THURSDAY. Do they want me to send them every date of Thursday of the year? Because last time I sent them the one date and here we are, so obviously that won’t work.

So I once again tell them “hey, ALL of my paydays have been changed to Thursdays. I need to make your app understand this. Last time I let you guys know before hand and I still got a penalty. I use to be able to withdrawal $75 and now I can only withdrawal $35 because it thinks my check was late rather then my paydate being Thursday instead of Wednesday. And it STILL thinks i get payed on Wednesdays. How do we fix this”

They responded that they would be transferring my case over to a specialist, this was two hours ago. They never got back to me and won’t respond to my messages.

This was such a simple issue that apparently nobody on their team can fix, and by not responding at all they are being completely unprofessional. If I could give this app negative stars I would.

I have referred three people to this app, which I regret. We will ALL be deleting our “genius” subscription and our accounts.

Initially I enjoyed the Albert app as it helped me navigate how to better allocate my finances. I also loved that I was able to create a savings without thinking about it as it automatically withdrawals a set amount from my checking.
This all, however, pales in comparison to how I feel about the Albert app, the creator(s) of the Albert app and the employees of the Albert app to date.
Let me start by saying that if you have any issue whatsoever with this app do not expect to receive any help. There is no customer service number. There isn’t any support email. There is “chat” and it is simply that. A small chat about your concern and/or issue with no resolution coming from it.
Each time I reached out I received a different response or “solution”, all to no avail, of course.
For SEVEN WEEKS I have been trying to transfer my Albert savings to my bank account.
SEVEN WEEKS.
In the meantime I’ve lost cell phone service and have fallen behind in a car payment. It is money that I relied on to bridge the gap of my unexpected unemployment and it has since been held hostage by the Albert company who has refused to give my OWN money.
First they told me that my bank account was no longer connected. I explained that I added a new bank account as the previous one no longer existed.
Then they told me that the new account had to be verified by their partner (Plaid) and that I needed to be patient. I (patiently) told them that I had already verified via Plaid weeks ago.
Next they tell me that I need to verify the new bank with a statement from the bank. Funny enough I went on the app to do so and it already said “bank account connected and verified”.
So I’m excited! I try to transfer my money AGAIN and it tells me transfer failed due to my PREVIOUS account now not being verified. Of course, I cannot verify the old account because it is no longer in existence.
THEN the app directs me to enroll in Albert cash in order to receive my money. So I do. But then (drumroll please…) it tells me to yet again verify my old account in order to withdrawal my savings into my new account.
So I contact “customer service” again and was told that I signed the agreement upon activating the apps services and that there was nothing they could do.
So there’s that. I have money that has been taken from my checking and I am no allowed to have it.
I have asked FIVE TIMES for someone to call me.
This has yet to happen.
Seven weeks later, bills unpaid, credit score dropped and looking for a good financial attorney is what I got from the Albert App.
PLEASE DO NOT TRUST THESE PROPLE!

I recently signed up for Albert in a pinch to cover expenses with the instant cash feature they offer.

The app seemed great and the reviews looked decent at the time.

Upon signing up for Albert, they have you link your bank account and then enroll you in their banking program and mail you a debit card.

The instant cash feature is supposed to deposit straight into your external bank account. Accounts are linked through Plaid and verification is nearly instant.

After 3 days of having my accounts linked, the instant cash feature was still unavailable. It stated it was “waiting to verify my account” and that I would be notified when the verification had completed.

I checked my linked accounts to verify they had synced and the accounts were linked successfully without issue, yet instant cash was still unavailable.

At this point, I began to reach out for support.

Albert does not have a phone number you can call, they do not have a physical address, they do not have a live-chat feature nor their business hours listed.

If you need support, by default they route you to text a 6-digit number for support. Otherwise, if you do some research, you can find a support email they don’t make readily available.

I texted support and didn’t receive a response for hours.

There was no auto-response to let you know support received your request, there was also no response if you messaged them outside of business hours.

It was as if Albert had ghosted me.

When I realized I was unable to reach support, it started to raise some red flags with trusting Albert.

Their business model handles people’s money. If you handle the money of others, you need to be reachable for support.

I un-linked my financial information from Albert and then proceeded to delete my account.

It wasn’t until after deleting my account that I received a response back from Albert support.

They stated “ Thanks for your patience. It looks like your account has been closed. Let us know if there's anything else we can do for you and thanks for trying Albert!”

No support was provided at all until after I deleted my account. Even after deleting my account, support didn’t acknowledge my issue.

If you’re ok with having an unreachable entity handle your finances, Albert may be for you.

Upon deleting my account, they asked a reason for my account deletion. I selected “I do not trust Albert” from the list.

Trust must be a common issue with them as they have it as a selectable option for account deletion when you go to delete your account.

Never again, be careful with who you trust your finances with.

They require SSN, DOB, and Bank account info upon sign-up.

Stay away from Albert!

Let me start by saying I am a high level manager of a large corporation in the United States with a Ph.D., and if it could happen to me, it could happen to you. I read the description and loved the concept; seemed like a good investment however I couldn’t have been more wrong. Here’s my experience with the app...

I downloaded “Albert” on a Saturday morning. The sign up process forces you to subscribe to a monthly or annual service fee BEFORE it does a single useful thing for you (first red flag: ignored). In good faith, I selected the annual option as it gives a nice discount for doing so. Once I linked all my accounts (which took quite some to do), I realized it clearly wasn’t working as it reported I had only spent $75 over the last three months (which was about $12,000 off the actual figure). It also misrepresented my bank account balance which surprised me to a point of logging into Wells Fargo to make sure wasn’t the case.

That’s when I thought, well maybe I should reach out to someone to get some help. The only option for contacting someone was to send a text to a random phone number it had automatically added as a contact into my phone. I sent a text message saying that it didn’t appear to be working and got some robot response saying someone would contact me on Monday. Feeling extremely disappointed with a three day lag time, I thought it better to just cancel the whole thing.

That’s when things got interesting. There’s no clear way to get out of it. After following an obscure, hoop jumping process which attempts to make you think it’s easy to cancel if you just follow the “easy steps” which I did, only to discover an error message saying that I can’t actually delete the app or cancel my subscription.

Back to the random text robot I go and say “Please cancel my membership. Not interested. You do not have authorization to take any money from my account. Thank you.” Followed by “Cancel Genius” after reading blogs stating the same thing happened to them and they billed them anyway. I did get a response on Monday, which gave this long explanation about why I shouldn’t cancel the app which I basically ignored.

Fast forward to today (fully four days later) - I woke up to my account being drained and find that “Albert Finance” was the culprit for my now overdrafted bank account. I try desperately to find a number to call - nope, no calls please, text us so we can text back when it’s convenient. I send a screenshot of my bank account and ask why they decided to bill me after four days, especially after I told them not to and that I requested cancellation. I received a response later giving some random apology “for the confusion” and that they will only reimburse the subscription - not the overdraft fees, but not for another three business days.

So here I sit with a family of six, the day before Thanksgiving without a penny to my name, courtesy of Albert Finance. I suggest you avoid this program and its team of carefree text bots and use something that actually works. I’ll be taking this developer to small claims next week as I sit hungry with my family for Thanksgiving and at least be thankful that I’m alive and have learned a valuable lesson.

Don’t let this be you.

The Albert app is ok. It’ll save money for you but it’s not consistent at all on the frequency of withdrawals from your banking account.

Then on the off chance something happens and you don’t have money in your account on the pay back day, you can get screwed hard if your not careful. I don’t recall the issue now, maybe I didn’t receive my paycheck the day I was supposed to or something. I had funds in my rainy day account but because I wasn’t able to pay the amount back, which wasn’t very much at all which is another issue, my account got temporarily suspended. Because of this, the rainy day fund was not accessible to me and I couldn’t retrieve those funds. It still took money out of my bank account for the rainy day funds once my check hit my account however. I was very mad to say the least. I was sure to let them know that.

Another issue is the fact it drops your advance amount to the floor if you have any issue whatsoever. Like the one described above. I was making 640 gross and could only get an advance of $25. It did not ever increase. Even almost a year later it hasn’t increased at all.

Now that the child tax credit thing is taking place it apparently has caused another issue. I’ve been getting the small advance of 25$ for a few weeks in a row now but all the sudden I’m for some reason not eligible for advances now. I’ve pay them all back and and time with out any incidents except the one described above and that was probably 10 months ago or more.
It says I need to have “received recent pay check on time” which I have. I’m currently getting unemployment and it comes religiously the same day every week and what’s more, it drops the same time every week with in minutes of the same time every week.
It also states that I need to have consistent income over the past two months. The last two have been identical and I mean right down to the very scent. Not one penny difference. It says I need to have a monthly income of greater that $1,000 over the last two months which I have. It states that I need to have a balance greater than $0 which I do. The only one I’ve not met that it says I need to is “received two paychecks greater than $400 or one greater than $600 and I have not.
So let’s be real here. Even a person who’s working and getting paid minimum wage and gets paid every week wouldn’t bring in but maybe 200. I was getting 640 a week before taxes and child support. Unemployment only pays you about half of your income and then you still get the same dollar amount taken out for child support so now I get right about 200 a week which isn’t enough for anything except to keep you from starving.

One last issue that comes to mind at the moment is the fact that you have to pay 4.99 instant fee no matter how much the advanced amount is. The couple times I was able to get more than 25$ I’m sure it was $4.99 fee. If your get a &75 or a $25 advance you pay a fee of $4.99 for an instant advance fee. The advance that is not instant says it’s free but I can not attest to that because it takes 3 days if it’s not instant. If you get paid every week who’s gonna be able to wait 3 days on the advance. If you need an advance, chances are it’s been a couple days since pay day. Say Friday is payday, Monday you need some cash so u hit up Albert like hey buddy what’s up. Albert says sure buddy I got ya in 3 days. Tuesday, Wednesday then Thursday? What’s one more day at that point. May not been too bad if you get paid every two weeks or once or twice a month. Over all, this app is kind of a pain. There’s others out there that I’m positive are far better. There’s a bear out there that’s 10x better than this app. I’ve gave this app multiple tries and it always fails me some how eventually. I wish I hadn’t ever tried it if I’m being honest.

GM today is the 3rd on November 1st I manually paid 52 dollars to Albert and is still in green pending then I get a 95 dollar charge which now my bank account is negative if u look it shows I paid it back and I'm not paying double for something I did pay .I have contacted my bank and shows paid and taken out now I have contacted the better business bureau do to this is the second time .no one has gotten back to me no response from customer service and I'm very angry so now I'm going to report this to the better business bureau and I have my lawyer looking into this with every piece of info I have

They literally make it impossible to close your account. I keep trying to pay back the outstanding balance but it won’t let me. I tried contacting customer support but it’s through text and doubt it’s a real individual. It says it’ll charge me an annual fee and something about smart money. I’m trying to close the account not pay money into it.

10/2/23- Took my money out of my account twice without authorization. Supposedly for SMART MONEY which I never signed up for. Then was told they COULD NOT refund me. Have been fighting with them ever since. I have sent texts with the proof from my bank account where they took it. Caused my bank account to overdraft and incurred overdraft fees. THIEVES and FRAUDS

My phone was compromised. When I reached out for help from the staff at Albert I was lied to. They believed the charges to be valid and did no further research. However, another account was compromised, and that financial institution found after investigating that the charges were fraudulent. Albert has done nothing but blow me off. They do not respond. They have pushed me to the brink of a full out breakdown. They refuse to be honest. They have lied multiple times in emails and text messages. They have lied about investigations. They have lied constantly and consistently. I cannot bear it any more. These people need shut down.

$179 was taken out of my account without my consent or knowledge that was my rent money. I contact customer support and after them transferring me 4 times! They said my refund would be in my account in 4-6 business days it's been way longer and I contact them again just to keep getting transfered over and over again everyday my rent is late they charge me extra so y'all are screwing me badly I want a Supervisor not a account specialist to call me! [protected]

I cannot stand this company. Twice they pulled unauthorized transactions from my account. The first time I asked for my money back and they told me that I had to wait 10 days to get my money back. So I unlinked my bank account because they were so quick to take money. Now here I am three weeks later and they charged me somehow with $179.88 and made my account go into overdraft. They had no authorization and when I asked them about this they did not respond. These people do not have a phone number you can call they want you to text and email. I am so angry I will be reporting them to all accounting services and regulators. This is ridiculous. Now I cannot go into the app to view these transactions because my bank account isn’t linked so how the heck were you all able to pull money?

Albert took out of my checking account $179.00 at 10:22pm on 09/26/2023. upon reaching out via text. I was told this was for an annual subscription amount, In which i subscribed to monthly. This was my electric bill money. Then text albert for over an hour and then began to reach out to them via email. No responses to my emails. So now I am to be without electricity, can't do my job because I work from home because Albert stole my money . This is very disheartening and unacceptable. I need my money put back into my account today, just like it was taken out of my checking account

My employer deposited my check on 9/22/23, voucher #1676472. In a text conversation with "customer service" they stated my check was deposited but is not reflecting in my account. I was told that a supervisor would look at my account and that I would be contacted shortly regarding the matter. I have received no update and "customer service" is no longer responding to my inquires about where my money is.

First off this company offers monthly subscription which is fine, and then charges all 12 months at once without your knowledge. It has been 5 business days and I still have not seen my refund for that charge. I then use the Rainy Day fund and investing app and even after 6 days I cannot move the funds at all. The app keeps moving 2 and 3 dollars here and there so I cannot pull out all my money. Stole 300 dollars from me that I am now going to have to call my bank to get charged back because support won't give me an answer.

I only had an Albert for a month. My card information was stolen and charged at two different gas stations for almost $500. The charges were still pending when I contacted Albert and was told I needed to wait for the transactions to go through before reporting it. I waited until they went through, they did an “investigation” and determined that this was not unusual activity and consistent with my spending. How is it consistent when I have only had an account for a month and never spend more then $50 at a gas station. Lack of customer support, you will get no assistance.

I made a transfer 3 days ago and it was for $190 . Well I look to see my transfer today and I see a balance of $93, I messaged support and after I informed them of the issue , they told me the balance and I let them know I was upset which anyone would be... But then they just stop replying...I have screenshots as well and I want this fixed! I should have $190 in my account! And I should be able to get an advance after this...

These fools are a scam. I downloaded app did all required then app says can’t connect to debit card. Ok whatever I deleted app and forget. Go to put gas today in empty gas tank and declined. Huh? I checked bank account earlier and was fine. Login and check again. Wtf? Albert took multiple random withdrawals putting account to .18 cents. Texted the stupid #. Said fix this cause I didn’t authorize withdrawals. 6 hours later including me sending them proof THEy took the money NOTHING! I’ve closed account blocked Albert from any withdrawals from account and guess write off the money they took and walk to work tmrw. Beware fellow Americans. This [censored] is crooked. Think about it. Even 8 dollars over a million subscribers put into a low interest account gives them plenty of free money. Even if they had to refund all stolen 8 dollars to a million subscribers

I very rarely use Albert and only use this company as a rainy day fund. On 4/10/23 I transferred $977.98 into Albert and 4/17 I transferred in $763.15. Just 3 days later my account had 15 Fraudulent transactions totaling $1205.69. The fraud transactions are as follows: $6.55 and 10.00 to Shell Gas station $28, $55.95, $105.95, $95.95 all to Food Lion Grocer $106.95, $105.95, $106.95 to Walgreens $305.95 to Food Lion. $33.21, $4.46 to Shell Corporation. $100 to Walmart. $32.76 to Z Mart. $0.11 to Kwik Sak. All 15 Fraudulent transactions occurred that day. 2 days later I check my account and see this, I immediately call/email Albert and report the Fraud Transactions. No one answers when I call and I have to leave a voicemail and Email. A few days later. I get an email back with the claim number c7bf29439d53 and their response saying "they determined the spending patter matches previous account activity, the transactions patter isn't indicative of Fraud, and authorized transactions occurred after it was claimed to be lost/stolen". None of their responses are true or accurate. I have never shopped at any of the stores that the 15 fraudulent transactions took place. I also rarely use Albert and have had no more then 5 transactions all year. There were 15 fraudulent transactions on the same day just 2 days after I put money into the account. I then asked for justification of their findings and Albert just sends me the transaction history and no justification to their findings or how they determined there Review. I am seeking Albert to reimburse the money taking from my account from the 15 fraudulent transactions. In the State of Tennessee this amount of theft is considered a Class D felony.

Albert does this thing where it rounds your dollars so you see the nearest dollar amount. For example I will spend 2.34 but it will show I spent $2. That really was not an issue for me until it started not updating my transactions. I would be thinking my money I saw today will be the same money I see tomorrow, nope, someone was using my card. I reported it to Albert multiple times and even changed cards three times. I also locked my cards myself u til i needed to use it. I will admit I was lazy and was struggling with having to print out each dispute form and fill it out, so I tried to do it through the Albert Genius and over the phone. They all still sent me the forms so I had to go out to UPS and pay for the forms to be printed (42 pages), fill them out manually, then take pictures of each and every single page to text through the app. Then I had to wait 3 days (which was only 1 day) for a bogus decision. They barely reviewed the case and said “sorry case is closed and we have determined nothing fraudulent happened.” I asked them for info and they kept dismissing me and suggesting I reach out to the merchants. 2 merchants I can’t even find traces of on google, and another merchant is Albert themselves because they were charging me ATM fees for an ATM i never went to. Albert is ridiculous and thats why I moved my direct deposit to my Citi Savings. I would rather no advance than to be eligible for an advance but my paychecks are being used by someone.

Do not let them withhold your cash from you with out your permission. So I set up the Rainy day fund savings with them . Sounded like a convenient way to stash some cash out of sight out of mind , wouldn’t touch it if I don’t have it in my main account . So I started jt , they took money a couple times , but I noticed that I couldn’t do anything with the money they took? I couldn’t even transfer it between checking and savings in their own app. When questioned they said to allow 3-6 business days , ok this was day 3 , I checked the next day , same issue , the next day same issues and finally I was reassured that since the next day would be the 6th business day that I would be allowed to move my money…. Nope …. And when asked about it they smuggly said “today is day 6 so we are still within the time frame specified, check back tomorrow but don’t contact us again unless it’s not available by the completion of the business day tomorrow (which would be 7 days)” are you kidding me ? I just got told to “shut up and stop asking us about your money” by an app that I was paying for the service like an idiot. They hold your money do they can use it for investing and to collect interest on it , they hold it as long as possible regardless of your situation and will give smug answers while you can do nothing . Apps a joke . All the positive reviews must be paid for or employee written . Don’t let them fraudulently withhold your money too , you’ve been warned . Next stop ComplaintsBoard.com

They just took money out of my account after I cancelled this service 3 months ago, I’m the middle of the night like thieves. There’s no number to call so now I’m stuck emailing some nameless person. Just open a regular bank account. This is not worth it. If my funds aren’t returned I will be seeking legal action against the company for wire fraud. Even the agent has acknowledged my account was deactivated. Only companies who are big on fraud don’t have customer service numbers. They are refusing to give my money back stating I opened the account in 2020. I still have the messages in my phone from when the account was closed. I even noticed it hey have been taking money out for a saving account. How are y’all taking money out for a saving account that isn’t open and charging me for Albert Genius. I am absolutely fuming. How do take an arch without someone’s permission? I will be speaking to a lawyer since “support” refuses to respond

Update: I was told that this was being escalated and later received an email that has nothing to do with the issue. I have already filed a complaint with the FTC and will be filing one with the FDIC as well. I don’t think they even have a customer service department but a handful of people sending automated responses. I will take this as far as I can take it. They can’t keep getting away with taking money from people and are frauds that need to be shut down. I wonder how many other people that have illegally withdrew funds from that just chalked it up as a loss?

Faithfully, I advance the amount of money I can every week and faithfully, you all get your reimbursement. I used to be able to get my money instantly and just have to pay an extra $3.99 fee, but now I have to be a GENIUS subscriber and I don’t want to subscribe to that. This was supposed to be convenient and NOW it’s not. I have to wait a WHOLE 1-2 days for you all to verify my repayment which the money is out and gone out of my account already and you all used to verify my account INSTANTLY and my advance would be there the SAME DAY, but not anymore. So on top of waiting a day or two for the advancement to show up, when it FINALLY does show up, I can no longer get my money instantly and pay the $3.99 fee, I now have to be a GENIUS subscriber (which I don’t want to be) so now I have to select the only one available to a non-Genius subscriber which is receiving my advance in 2-3 business days. It just feels like a rip off and I want to honesty stop using Albert and just keep my own money instead of them taking it out because it takes longer to get it back to my account now. I don’t like the changes and if you are going to do something one way, KEEP it that way and DON’T switch up - that’s how you lose customers and business. It was just fine with you all getting that extra $3.99 fee for me to get my money instantly, but now it’s just too much and no longer convenient, by the time I get my advancement, the money is going right back to you. It’s just kind of ridiculous now and I’d rather just not use Albert anymore.

I have been using this app over a year and loved that I was able to save with it. However last week my account was hacked. They texted saying my password had been changed and I immediately responded that I did not do this and received an auto response that their “geniuses” were sleeping and would respond later. I tried multiple times to get back into the account and was told there was no record of my account and gave me options to open one. This was because the hacker had changed all of my info so it didn’t recognize my log in information. 3 days later I still haven’t received any help to retrieve my account. I get the same auto response through text and their support email that they can’t find any acct under my info and to please provide alternate emails/numbers that might be associated. But somehow I still got a notification on my phone that my money was withdrawn which means the hacker successfully stole all of my money. I have asked multiple times to speak with a real person and get no response. I think it’s extremely ridiculous that a company who has access to your bank account and such personal information gives no way for you to speak with a representative. The only option is texting/emailing a robot. It’s obvious that even my email responses are sent by automation. If you read the other one star reviews you will see that they respond to each saying to text or email their support for help. I guess I will have to settle with the fact that all of the money I had been saving was for nothing because I will obviously never see it again.

I’ve been using the app for a few months with no problem, then a week ago, I set up direct deposit. Payday came with no mo ey. I texted them; turns out they can’t direct deposit funds not in my name (totally my fault; I thought my husbands name was on the account). They told me to get in touch with his payroll people to get the deposit reversed. No problem — he called them and they immediately sent the authorization to reverse the deposit back to them so they could deposit into an account with his name on it. They told us 3-5 days.

That was a week ago, and the deposit has yet to be reversed. Husband’s payroll provider says the Albert and Sutton Bank have done *absolutely nothingin regards to the deposit reversal filed last week. Our money is literally just sitting there, waiting, while our rent and car payments get further and further past due.

I emailed them today to find out what ylyhe holdup is, and NOW, they want all kinds of extra crap that they did NOT ask for initially: selfies of me and my husband, pictures of his ID, selfies of us *holdingthe ID, a picture of mail that has both of our names and our address on it, etc. Just stuff that seems completely unnecessary and random. It feels like a stalling tactic, to be honest. I mean, they *neveractually deposited the money, so why do they all of a sudden need all these extra pieces of information.

I’m sending them everything they’ve asked for today, but I’m also contacting an attorney, because I’m convinced that I won’t see our money unless I pursue legal action.

Stay far, far away.

I’m incredibly upset with how Albert has morphed its business model. Long time believer and user here, I even sent others to this app.

However, two recent experiences were so twisted, this review will warn others who are going through the same thing.

1. When I recently logged in, I was prompted through a series of aggressive Genius messaging. I wish I took screenshots to quote verbatim, but there was no way to avoid them pushing Genius until I hit a button that accepted the service. It was only on the last card, right before confirmation, that I could exit out of the modal. Aggressive, bad-faith UX.

2. Mildly peeved, I looked into initiating the account closing process. It wasn’t easy to find (but I’ve noticed this is true for most apps these days, so predatory, ugh). I eventually figured it out and initiated a funds transfer so my balance would be 0, and I could click “delete” (according to their instructions). Then I waited for this to show up in my primary bank account. Turns out, they withdrew money the next day, so I was back to square one. Mind you, I’ve paused savings on Albert a while ago but somehow they kept withdrawing. Which was fine by me, as long as I could send it back to my back. I tried unlinking my primary bank account but the app won’t let me. I initiated app wouldn’t let me (which makes sense according to their model, but I literally don’t know how to stop this steady flow y’all keep initiating, my dudes).

So frustrating but mostly sad. I can’t believe this once-favorite is now exploiting user cluelessness to keep us around.