What happens if your bank account is levied with no money in it?

MoneyWatch: Managing Your Money What happens if your bank account is levied with no money in it? We may receive commissions from some links to products on this page. Promotions are subject to availability and retailer terms. .chip { background-image: url('/fly/bundles/cbsnewscore/images/chip-bgd/chip-bgd-moneywatch.jpg'); } By Angelica Leicht Angelica Leicht Senior Editor, Managing Your Money Angelica Leicht is the senior editor for the Managing Your Money section for CBSNews.com, where she writes and edits articles on a range of personal finance topics. Angelica previously held editing roles at The Simple Dollar, Interest, HousingWire and other financial publications. Read Full Bio Angelica Leicht April 8, 2026 / 11:15 AM EDT / CBS News Add CBS News on Google A bank levy on an empty account may buy you a brief reprieve, but it won't make the debt go away. OlekStock/Getty Images Household debt in the United States has climbed to record levels, with borrowers currently collectively carrying more than $18.5 trillion in consumer debt. As those balances grow, though, and more borrowers fall behind, creditors are increasingly turning to aggressive collection tools — including bank levies — to recover what they're owed. For many people, the threat of a levy arrives long before they fully understand its impact on their finances.A bank levy gives a creditor the legal right to seize funds directly from your account to satisfy a debt judgment. Unlike a wage garnishment, which takes a percentage of each paycheck over time, a levy is a one-time freeze-and-seize action targeting whatever money sits in your account on a given day. It's one of the more jarring tools in a debt collector's arsenal and it can happen faster than many borrowers expect once a court judgment is entered against them.But what if the account a creditor targets is empty? In these cases, the mechanics of what unfolds next are less straightforward than they might seem. Learn about the deb...