Bank Of America Fees

Bank Of America Fees, Bank fees are in the spotlight again. The Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America is planning to roll out new checking account fees, and the news stirred up negative sentiment in the social mediaverse almost immediately, with consumers reacting angrily to the idea.

Chase, meanwhile, wants to charge customers even more than the $12 some of them are already paying each month. Following last year’s controversial (and ham-handed) attempts to implement debit card fees, banks are treading more carefully these days. But the latest news indicates that fees are going to remain a hot-button issue in the months ahead.

Bank of America spokeswoman Anne Pace says the fees reported by the Journal on Thursday are nothing new. Pilot programs going on in a trio of states are testing monthly account fees ranging from $9 to $25. “We have been testing in select markets for more than a year and plan to continue to learn from those tests,” she says via email. BofA isn’t commenting on a timeline for a broader rollout, and Pace says exactly how BofA will set up accounts and fees is still under consideration. “We have made no decisions on the construct of new product offerings,” she says.

The Journal cites an anonymous BofA source that says the new checking requirements could come in “a few months.”

But Pace does confirm one aspect of Bank of America’s plans. While the WSJ speculated that the bank’s bottom-tier checking account would come with a mandatory monthly fee that couldn’t be waived under any circumstances, Pace says that idea’s not on the table. “All our current and future accounts offer ways to avoid fees,” she says.

This may or may not be good news for consumers, depending on what those ways consist of. Last fall, with Bank of America and Chase embroiled in debit-fee disputes, Citibank announced it would not implement a debit fee and then debuted a new line-up of checking accounts with significantly higher minimum balance requirements for a customer to avoid monthly fees.

Bank Of America Fee

Bank Of America Fee, Following weeks of consumer protest, Bank of America announced today that it is dropping its plan to begin charging consumers a monthly $5 debit card fee. Bank of America’s decision demonstrates that consumers can have a big impact on banking industry practices by joining together and making their voices heard, according to Consumers Union, the advocacy arm of Consumer Reports.

“Consumers have the power to make the big banks back down from unfair practices if they raise their voices and vote with their feet and their dollars,” said Norma Garcia, manager of Consumers Union’s financial services program. “In the end, Bank of America understood that it risked losing too many valuable customers by charging an unfair debit card fee.”

Bank of America’s announcement in September that it planned to charge most of its customers a monthly debit card fee beginning in 2012 sparked a huge public outcry. The public protest added significant momentum to a growing movement among consumers to transfer their accounts from big banks to credit unions and smaller community banks.

Over the past week, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, SunTrust Bank, and Regions Financial Corp. have all backed away from plans to charge monthly fees for debit card purchases. Bank of America was the only major bank left with plans to charge a debit card fee until it caved to public pressure today.

“The public backlash over debit card fees should serve as a big wake up call to banks that they can’t take their customers for granted,” said Pamela Banks, senior policy counsel for Consumers Union. “While banks may come back with other fees in the future, they’ll be gauging public reaction carefully. Consumers should be on the lookout for new fees and remember that if they’re not happy with how they are being treated, they should shop around for a bank or credit union for a better deal.”

Consumers Union has developed a set of tips to help guide consumers interested in switching their accounts to a new financial institution. The tips along with a “How-To Change Banks” video is available at www.DefendYourDollars.org.