Numi Financial Skims Unauthorized Fees From Inmates’ Accounts, Class Action Says

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A former jail inmate from Georgia says Numi Financial has been unlawfully deducting fees from inmates’ funds that are held in trust during their custody.

Plaintiff Anthony Oliver claims defendants First Century Bank NA and Stored Value Cards Inc., which does business as Numi Financial, have been unlawfully contracting with law enforcement agencies to hold the funds of jail and prison inmates while deducting significant amounts of money from those funds in the form of fees that the inmates never consent to pay.

According to the Numi Financial class action lawsuit, whenever a person is taken into jail or prison for any length of time, all their personal possessions that they bring with them are confiscated.

Historically, any cash an inmate brought in on their person was confiscated along with all their other belongings. Upon release, the inmate could expect to receive the exact same amount of cash back.

But Numi Financial offers law enforcement officials a different way to handle inmate’s currency. Under this arrangement, the inmate deposits any cash into an on-premises ATM. Those funds are held in an “inmate trust account” and returned to the inmate upon their release in the form of a prepaid debit card.

The cost of this system is borne by the inmates, who are forced against their will to pay fees for the alleged service, Oliver claims. Maintenance fees, ATM fees, and purchase transaction fees all get deducted from the inmate’s account balance before the funds are returned, he says.

Oliver reports that typical fees involved in this scheme include a $2.95 fee for each purchase made using the debit card, a weekly service fee of $2.50, and a $0.95 fee for declined transactions.

Inmates no longer have the option of having their money held in cash form, Oliver says. Whether they want to or not, they must submit to Numi Financial’s debit card system and pay the associated fees.

Oliver says he was subject to these Numi Financial unauthorized fees after his October 2016 arrest. He was taken into custody at the Chatham County jail in Savannah, Ga., during which all the cash on his person was confiscated.

When Oliver was released in December, he was given a Numi Financial debit card with access to the remaining funds in his inmate trust account. He was offered no paperwork disclosing the fees he could incur or any other terms and conditions associated with that account, he claims.

He continued to use that debit card to pay for transactions after his release, unaware that each transaction was subject to fees ranging from $1.50 to $2.95. The account was also subject to a weekly $2.50 “maintenance fee,” he later found out. Oliver went through a similar ordeal when he was taken into custody again in February 2017.

Oliver proposes to represent a nationwide plaintiff Class consisting of all persons in the U.S. who, within four years of the filing of this action, were taken into custody by law enforcement and upon their release given a Numi Financial debit card containing any remaining funds from their inmate trust account after deduction of fees.

He is asking the court for an award of actual, compensatory and punitive damages, restitution of monies gained through the allegedly unlawful conduct, and injunctive relief barring Numi Financial from continuing the practice complained of here. He also seeks reimbursement of court costs and attorneys’ fees.

Oliver is represented by attorney James A. Tabb of Zaveri Tabb APC and Eugene Y. Turin of McGuire Law PC.

The Numi Financial Unauthorized Fees Class Action Lawsuit is Anthony Oliver v. First Century Bank NA, et al., Case No. 3:17-cv-00620, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.