My landlord charged me a $50 fee for a failed autodraft payment glitch

Location: Huntsville, Alabama, USA

I know this is ultimately a small problem, but I feel like my landlord just stole $50 from me and I can’t do anything about it.

I’ve been on autopay bank drafting for over a year. I got a call today that they tried to draft my account, but it failed and I have to pay a $50 fee. They originally said it was a NSF (non-sufficient funds) issue. I quickly explained that was impossible. I had plenty of money in my account. I went by my bank and they confirmed my account info was correct and I had money.

Then they claimed that the bank the landlord uses to process leasing payments tried to run my autodraft and it failed. Unfortunately my lease does specifically say that a failed ACH payment results in a $50 fee. (The rent isn’t late, it’s just a fee for the failed draft.) I complained because my autodraft has worked for over a year with no issues. Nothing has changed. My bank account is all the same, etc. If there was any reason that it could have been my fault, I’d let it go.

I asked if we could contact their bank. They emailed them and got the response that something must have been typed in incorrectly. They didn’t try to communicate further with their bank and they’ve given me no paper trail on this. I’m just taking their word for it. The landlord company said that it was a banking issue and there was nothing they could do. When I asked if I could talk to the bank myself, they refused. When I asked the name of the bank, they refused.

I feel like this is extremely unfair. Surely they can’t just claim a bad autodraft and charge me $50 without any kind of proof or explanation?

I have a meeting on Monday with the Property Manager. They are apparently out until then.

Is there anything I can do here?