<p>When we tackled this issue before our D’s first year, we initially decided to go with BofA because of the campus ATM being BofA and the fact that our bank (US Bank) has no East Coast presence whatsoever, so that wasn’t even an option. However, we are from Minnesota and as there are no BofA branches here (and only one affiliated ATM in downtown Minneapolis) we decided to open a BoA online student e-checking account for our daughter. Unfortunately, since she had no credit rating of any kind at the time, (and so didn’t exist as far as the credit reporting companies were concerned) they wouldn’t open an account for her. She had had a Visa Buxx card through our account at US Bank since she was 14, but that didn’t count since it was under our name. </p>
<p>I then opened an online BoA account for myself and figured I would add her as an additional user and just keep that account for her use. Unfortunately, I again ran into problems because they wouldn’t add her to the account under those circumstances either and they were not helpful in trying to find a solution. Since I really had no history with them as a customer (other than making an initial deposit to open the account), they didn’t seem at at all interested in trying to making it work. I won’t even go into the hassle I went through with BofA to then close that account and get the money out of it (since with only one ATM in the area, it was essentially useless to me). Needless to say, I would never use BofA for anything in the future.</p>
<p>What eventually worked well for us was adding an account for her to our online ING account (now CapitalOne 360) and with that she got a Visa debit card (or maybe it was MasterCard) that could be used at a number of ATMs in the Ville without fees, or at the BofA ATM on campus (with a fee), the ability to direct deposit her work study checks and also online bill pay, etc. All of those services would have been available through her account at US Bank, too, but there would have been fees on any ATM use anywhere in Massachusetts.</p>