<p>Re post #119 – that’s not the type of ATM B/A uses. They have high end ATM’s with check scanning features & “deposit automation” – and from what I can find, a machine like that costs upwards of $40K. But B/A is getting its machines from Diebold & has a contract with them for maintenance and software, so it’s possible that B/A leases rather than buys the machines. (A lease arrangement would make sense for maintenance & upgrades, rather than B/A having to go out every couple of years and buy new machines as technology changes).</p>
<p>My bank was purchased by Wells Fargo. I have already had to negotiate my way through fees they have tried to slide in. One person tried to tell me that someone manually copies the checks onto the monthly statement, and thats why they were going to charge a fee for that. Really? Thats laughable. I am pretty sure the days of manual check readers are long gone.</p>
<p>If I have to change all my accounts to the credit union it will be a nightmare, so I am hopin g not to have to do that. So far most (not all) of the fees have been addressed to my satisfaction. We’ll see…</p>
<p>jym626, if you request copies of your checks, someone has to manually print and stuff your envelope, since they don’t send those automatically. That part is true. No they aren’t manually photocopying your check, but your statement would be pulled and manually processed. So by demanding special treatment, Wells Fargo is eating your cost.</p>
<p>MizzBee-
Apologies cor confusing you. I am referring currently to the teeny tiny check images they scan on bank statements. The bank wants to charge for this, and the person on the phone said someone manually copied the checks. Sorry , blowing the BS whistle on that one. I have also discovered that Wells Fargo has not trained the former Wachovia employees well. I have been told multiple diffeferent things about the accounts and the services from different people. Quite confusing.</p>
<p>Wells Fargo has plenty of our money that they are using. They aren’t losing a dime having us as customers.</p>
<p>Re: the types of ATMS…that is B of A’s choice. </p>
<p>Re: fees…when our small bank was bought out first by Fleet, and then by B of A…they offered us an account that assumed a MUCH higher daily balance than we had. We asked for the next level down which also didn’t have fees for the services we used. The bank folks at B of A told us we had to CLOSE that account and open a new one of the type we wanted. I told THEM that if I was going to close my account, it was not going to be to open another one at their bank…all it would take was a keystroke to change the type of account from what THEY wanted to what <em>I</em> wanted. They refused to budge. So I stood there and withdrew every penny from their bank…including two CDs that had fortunately come due right around the same time. They were shocked and THEN offered to make the change I requested. Now why did they do that? Did they think it made me feel better to get this change when I was withdrawing my money? It didn’t. I closed my account with them and have never looked back.</p>
<p>The ONLY reason my kids had B of A accounts was for the convenience of depositing when they were in college towns where we did not live. </p>
<p>I should have just closed the one account when the fraud issue took so long to resolve (6 months).</p>
<p>Time for our family to move on. If you want to continue banking with B of A…go ahead. I personally don’t. If I’m going to pay a fee to anyone, it’s not going to be to them.</p>
<p>My DS banks with a bank that has no freestanding facilities. He gets free ATM (charges from other banks are refunded up to a certain, fairly high amount), he scans his deposits on his Iphone and they are immediately deposited to his account, etc. This is the wave of banking. Yes, there are not brick and mortar costs, but when he calls the bank he always gets a human being to talk to, who is in the continental United States and who is easily understood, and any issues (like when he accidentally double paid his credit card bill and when he accidentally wrote a check off the wrong account) were immeditely addressed and they worked with him, removing any and all fees.</p>
<p>thumper, I’m not sure if your last comments were directed towards me or not but I’ve never banked with BOA. My U.S. accounts are with TD and always will be. I have no dog in the BOA race, nor am I an apologist for them but I believe that in any discussion, the claims should be factual. People hate banks, we all get that but to dredge up every issue for the past several years every time there is a new discussion about the banking industry is neither helpful nor worthwhile. I happen to agree that if you aren’t happy with your current bank, go elsewhere or if credit unions are so great, take your money there. I don’t get the anger and disdain if people are not willing to do that. I can’t think of any other type of business that people would continuing frequenting if they are so unhappy. As I said before, there are thousands and thousands of banks in the U.S. and presumably many credit unions. There certainly isn’t a lack of options for businesses providing financial services.</p>
<p>alwaysmom…comment is NOT directed to you. I totally agree with you…if you like the place…stay. If you don’t…then leave. Lots of options.</p>
<p>What I’m saying is…if folks are happy with B of A…then stay with them. This latest fee with B of A is the last straw for the B of A customers in my family. If someone else is happy with them…great.</p>
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<p>I have not tried to talk to anyone at BofA by phone since they instituted their live chat feature on on-line banking, which has worked fine for me.</p>
<p>I have banked with BofA for years, so I can’t really compare its service to other banks. The live tellers have always been exceptionally pleasant and helpful. I have had a couple of glitches over the years, which in all honestly, turned out to be my errors in all but a couple of cases, and the bank always made good on their errors.</p>
<p>I don’t get charged fees, and I don’t think I will get charged the new fees because I maintain a minimum balance and I only use my debit card for withdrawing cash anyway. My kids will get charged, but I still think the convenience of having their accounts linked to mine for easy transfers, and a branch located their town is worth the fee. If they want to avoid the fee, they can learn budgeting with cash and maybe make fewer impulse purchases, which is not a bad thing.</p>
<p>We ended up having some B of A accounts when they bought out our bank. Then, we opened a joint one there for our D so that she would have a nearby ATM w/o fees. She does tend to use it for purchases. Thanks to this thread, I did a search for cooperating ATM’s with our local credit union, and, lo and behold, there is one even closer to my D than B of A. So, yes, we are closing our B of A accounts. Even though we actually would be exempt from the charges. I hope many others follow.</p>
<p>I don’t understand why anyone is so concerned about BofA imposing this fee. If you don’t like it then don’t use BofA - it’s that simple. And even without this fee, if you’re a BofA customer you’re likely already paying fees on other things so for some reason or other you accept those fees for whatever service you’re receiving from BofA. If this new fee is the straw that broke the camel’s back, then simply don’t bank there anymore. </p>
<p>And if you don’t like fees then why are you using a ‘bank’ at all, which tend to charge irritating fees, rather than a credit union, which tend to not charge the irritating fees?</p>
<p>Re post #132-- I think that despite all of the griping and the bashing, many people have ended up at B/A because of the convenience & broad range of banking services. The big banks were on the forefront with many things, like ATMs, online banking & bill paying, etc. The credit unions now offer similar services, but it wasn’t always the case. (I have saved a LOT of postage over the years using the free online bill pay services; not to mention check-printing costs). </p>
<p>And I have a sneaking suspicion that many of these “last straw” people will still have accounts at B/A two years hence… (once they actually start looking seriously at their options). </p>
<p>After all, Starbucks still seems to be in business charging 3 times as much for a cup of coffee as the deli’s and bakeries that can invariably be found next door. And how many of the people who are so upset over the $5 monthly charge are carrying iPhone’s in their pocket, and think nothing of signing on & downloading new apps at $1.99 a pop?</p>
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<p>Actually, from what I can see & gather, the problem is that the the credit unions have a lot of small print and hoops to jump through to get the no-fee service. (You get a “free” account, but only if you use your debit card at least a dozen times during the month & make at least 2 electronic deposits, etc.)</p>
<p>The banks are charging higher fees and such because they are desperate to boost their bottom line. It isn’t about the cost of ATM networks or the conveniences they offer costing that much (ATM’s came about when banks streamlined their check processing and wire transfer operations to be computer to computer, ATM’s tap into the same technology). Basically, they are looking to boost their bottom line, especially because they are being regulated (and not, IMO, unreasonably so) in what they can do. New regulations are coming online that affect what banks can and can’t do:</p>
<p>-They are being limited in what they can charge stores in terms of debit card fees, they used to charge them as much as 50c a transaction, that is being limited I believe to 20cents</p>
<p>-Banks were making a lot of money on proprietary trading of things like derivatives (proprietary meaning for their own accounts, not for customer broker accounts) and in other types of financial issues (B of A got burned, big time, by the mortgage backed CDO securities, plus they face some serious fraud charges). On top of that, banks were both investing in/setting up hedge funds doing agressive trading, and lending them money as well for their trading (hedge funds have been known to be 60-1 leveraged, ie for every dollar they have under investment,they borrow 60). The FDIC , the FED and the government are proposing to strictly limit what banks can do in these areas, because the financial collapse and tarp bailout were directly a result of these activities (among other things, commercial banks lent hedge funds many 10’s of billions of dollars with CDO’s as collateral, which when the funds went under, well, were worth less then horse manure). Basically, the government is re-introducing some sections of the old Glass Steagal code, that stopped commercial banks from doing the kinds of things I have noted here.</p>
<p>In lieu of that, they figure they will get it from their customers and assume most will stay despite the fees. For example, if you switch to a credit union or regional bank (or “internet bank”) you can end up getting socked with ATM withdrawal fees, given you will have a hard time finding theirs, if they have them at all (and I just noticed that the ones who advertise “we’ll rebate the cost imposed by other bank ATM’s”, they limit it to 8 bucks a month…which these days, will get you maybe 4 withdrawals, the avg fee a bank charges outside bank customers is 2 bucks these days)…</p>
<p>Plus people have their electronic banking set up, they have the convenience of teller machines and so forth, and quite frankly, it is a pain to switch banks, you have to switch any auto deposits and auto withdrawals, and so forth. </p>
<p>As far as the anger at the banks for doing this, I think what people are feeling and expressing is that in a sense (and they are right to a certain extent IMO), banks messed up, they pulled all kinds of get rich schemes, needed to be bailed out by the government, and then when the government takes away their right to play around with funny money, they sock it to the people who in effect bailed them out…more importantly, I suspect most people realize that part of the current economic mess is that banks are still unwilling to loan money, there was an article in the Wall St Journal recently where small business owners are feeling optimistic enough to expand, but can’t get financing because banks won’t lend, and the auto and home loan dependent industries are being handcuffed by banks as well. They got burned, in many cases by their own greed, and then in effect punish everyone else for it, and I think that is part of what people are expressing.</p>
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All those examples involve the consumer choosing to make the purchase. No one is forcing anyone to buy a latte or download an itune, nor are they charging them for the right to buy, or for not doing so.</p>
<p>I have stuck by them for many years, but this latest charge is enough for me. I don’t have to pay it now since my mortgage is with them, but to me it seems that this company has lost its direction.</p>
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But you were fine with their now-outlawed practices on overdraft fees? $5 a month is over the top, but if if some kid racked up $120 in a day because the bank the bank was choosing to pay out all the debits & checks before crediting a deposit made the same day, that was fine & dandy? </p>
<p>B/A didn’t get where it is today by being generous to its customers. The only difference now is that changes in the law have forced it to be more transparent.</p>
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Nor does B/A force anyone to keep accounts with them. It’s the same choice - Starbucks or the neighborhood deli without the fancy logo on the cups? B/A or the local bank or credit union?</p>
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<p>I agree that is probably the source of the anger, but I think its misplaced. The banks were essentially cheating their customers by the way they handled their money, but it was all going on behind closed doors, and the federal deposit insurance system coupled with TARP meant that no consumers actually lost any money. (Without that safety net, what would have happened to the customers of failed banks?). </p>
<p>Now the regulations are forcing the banks to quit playing fast and loose, and so rather than robbing Peter to pay Paul, they are shifting to actually charging a certain set of customers for a specific service they received. The banks were never actually giving away free debit cards, they were just funding them out of someone else’s pocket. </p>
<p>As far as the lending goes, I think the real problem is current interest rates. I certainly don’t want to ever go back to the spiraling interest of the late 1980’s, but I don’t see how our economy is ever going to pick up when people are earning 0 interest on savings and the banks simply aren’t getting enough interest on conventional loans to make it an attractive financial proposition for them. High interest consumer debt – like credit cards – still seem to be readily available, but obviously a small business owner doesn’t want to finance their expansion on their MasterCard.</p>
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Is the problem the yield spread, or that banks just don’t want to make loans right now?</p>
<p>They are paying essentially zero on deposits (I think I am making 0.1% or something like that), who much of a spread do they need?</p>
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<p>That sums it up nicely. And they are being less and less generous every few months with new fees, poor customer service, and the like. </p>
<p>Like I said earlier…for us (and many others) there was a convenience factor when our kids were in college. Kids were one place…we were in another…B of A was in both. Kids had free “college student” accounts for years. </p>
<p>For us…time for a change. No loyalty to B of A, none at all.</p>