Insufficient Funds (redirected from NSF)

Insufficient Funds

A situation in which one does not have enough deposited in a bank account to cover all checks and/or electronic withdrawals. For example, if Bob writes Joe a check for $200, but there is only $175 in Bob's account, Bob has insufficient funds in his bank account and the bank likely will refuse to transfer the funds to Joe's account. However, some banks make requested transfers with insufficient funds but assess an overdraft fee on the account holder. This is especially true with electronic transactions. See also: Bounce.

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Insufficient funds. If you don't have enough money available in your checking account to cover the checks you've written or electronic debits you've authorized, you have insufficient funds (ISF) or nonsufficient funds (NSF).

A check written against insufficient funds is informally called a returned check, a bounced check, or a bad check. If you write one, your account is considered overdrawn.

Unless you have overdraft protection, which is a line of credit linked to your checking account, your bank will charge you an NSF fee, usually $20 to $35 per check.

The check or an electronic copy is returned unpaid to the person who deposited it. The payee's bank may also charge a fee for depositing a check written against insufficient funds.