Banks are charging record-high fees for existing services such as account maintenance and overdrafts. But banks are also getting creative, rolling out services — and fees — that never existed before. For instance, at one bank, if you’re sick of waiting on hold to talk to a customer service rep, you can pay a fee to cut the line.
ATM
Sandy Bump? Where Business Is Brisk After the Storm
No one should anticipate that a “Sandy stimulus” will kick the economy into a higher gear. Even so, Sandy has caused businesses of all shapes and sizes to be exceptionally busy — including a few you wouldn’t expect.
Are ‘Safe Accounts’ the Answer to Our Consumer Banking Problems?
So-called Safe Accounts offer extremely low fees and no overdraft penalties. Banks are still experimenting but the early results have been encouraging and a product geared at the unbanked may just right for many others too.
Bank of America Closed a Bunch of ATMs This Year
Almost exactly two years after Bank of America rolled out its “eBanking” checking account that costs nearly $9 a month if the customer wants service from actual human tellers, the bank’s recent quarterly report shows that …
ATMs with a Human Touch: How New ATMs May Replace Bank Tellers
ATMs are getting a new face — literally, a human face. Some bank customers are already encountering what might be called ATM cyborgs, in which a machine includes a screen showing a bank teller’s head. The teller, in a remote …
Bank Branches Are Closing; People Using Nearby ATMs Don’t Notice
The typical town’s main drag seems to have a bank in every third or fourth storefront, often with branches from the same institution within a few blocks of each other. But do consumers really need banks to be as ubiquitous as …
Is the ATM Cash-Dispensing Sound Fake?
In true Pavlovian form, humans are accustomed to getting excited at the sweet sound of an ATM dispensing cash. But is that sound artificially generated? If so, why?
Chase’s Pilot Program Testing $5 ATM Fee Crashes and Dies
In March, Chase ATMs in Texas and Illinois began charging jacked up ($4-$5) fees for each non-customer transaction. The fee hike has already proven to be a failure, however, and the charges are now back to $3 a pop (which is still sorta ridiculous, but by this point is basically the standard). One insider, commenting on Chase’s initial …
Bottled Water for Half Price—With No Bottle
Here comes a new kind of vending operation that promises to be the “ATM machine of water.” Using a BYO reusable bottle policy, the machines dispense purified water without the plastic bottle, and at a fraction of the price consumers now pay at a typical vending machine.
Big Banks, Bigger Fees
You’ve heard all about the rise of bank fees—from $5 ATM charges to the disappearance of free checking and beyond. Now all of those pesky fees and annoying account policy requirements are presented in one handsome infographic.
Insider Insight: Why Banks Keep Jacking Up ATM Fees
“You really don’t care if you piss off someone else’s customer.”
Here Comes the $5 ATM Fee
Last spring’s initiative to cap ATM fees at 50¢ per transaction went nowhere. In fact, ATM fees are heading in the opposite direction: Chase machines are now testing out fees of $4 and $5 a pop, and the fees are expected to increase and spread.
