If they charge a fee for paper statements, shift banks.

I'm a computer security expert. I do NOT accept electronic statements from my bank and credit card companies. Send me a physical paper trail.

Likewise, NEVER use your ATM card, in ANY form, at merchants. USe a real credit card instead.

Wells Fargo will charge you $25 to transfer funds from your savings account to your checking as part of the Overdraft Protection plan. So, while they keep you from overdrafting your account, they are still taking the fee...

I was looking at switching to BoA when I moved and their "Free Checking" account had a fee for talking to a teller at the bank. Incredible.

Yes, most banks have a fee for covering your transactions with Overdraft Protection. So you're not avoiding the fee, you're just paying a different one (usually a bit less).

Also, to students and recent graduates, make sure you know what kind of checking account you have at all times. Before First Union merged into Wachovia, we had a First Union student checking account. When I turned 23, although I was still in school, they converted my account to a basic, no-frills, "regular" checking account with a monthly fee. When I called them on it, they offered me a "free checking" account instead, which was identical to the one they set me up with automatically, but WITHOUT the fee.

In my experience most of these fees are much higher on the entry-level checking and savings plans. Once you upgrade to one of the higher-tier plans many if not all of these fees get waived. The downside is you need to keep a higher minimum balance but you often get much better interest rates as well.

If you have automatic bill payment from your bank, set a recurring payment of $50 to your credit card. No more late fees.

Just a neat tip for you guys about banks. For most of us that live paycheck to paycheck. If you have only like 3 dollars in your account and you still have like 2 or 3 days until you get paid (direct deposit i assume) you are not totally out of luck if you need gas to get to work. When you use your credit card at the pump, it only checks your account for 1 dollar. So, if you have like $1.24 in the account, go ahead and get you a full tank of gas for 30 bucks. It will check for the 1 dollar and let you get gas, then when you fill up, a few days later it will take the remaining money (in this case $29.00). Works like a charm. I know some friends i have told this too and it worked for them as well for everyone out there that will say my bank is just slow..

Bank of America charges $30 for an overdraft protection transfer. Whe I originally signed up for theprotection, I was under the impression that it would save me from being charged the fee when they transferred money out of my savings to cover a check. Boy was I wrong.

I can't stand bank fees and think they're an utter ripoff. A good alternative is to use a credit union. These are smaller financial institutions owned/controlled by the people who use them. They enjoy federal deposit insurance, generally have all the conveniences (online banking, decent network of ATMs, loan products, investment services, etc) with few of the annoyances (fees for everything, poor customer service, etc) of big banks. I'd strongly suggest looking into them.

@ScramDiggyBooBoo: Floating money is never a good idea, though, especially if your bank suddenly decides to change how it handles debits (i.e., subtracting them immediately).

@ScramDiggyBooBoo:

It's called floating, and it's illegal. That doesn't mean you won't get away with it as it's hardly ever prosecuted, but don't start screaming and crying when they take away credit card float as well.

That should have been *debit* card float.

And Chase charges something like a $7 ODP fee per use, which is annoying. But I admit it's far better than the $35 NSF fee.

Oh, and another tip for you. Assuming you know a transaction is coming through and you don't get charged for transfers, you can always try moving the funds yourself rather than rely on the automatic ODP. It works for me, assuming I have enough to cover the transaction plus the ODP memo-credit, which hits the instant the memo-debit hits. When that happens my transfer goes through before the ODP is calculated.

National City's online banking lists deposits as "pending" for 2-3 days after you deposit the money, and then it says completed. This is pretty standard but apparently they tack on an additional day or two after this where the payemnt is technically pending. So if you try to use the money after it has gone from pending to completed they can charge you over draft fees. I called in they said "oh well we have to wait a few days to make sure its cleared, thats on page 143 of the user agreement."
THATS WHAT "PENDING" MEANS. IF IT'S STILL PENDING, THEN JUST SAY ITS PENDING.

@ ScramDiggyBooBoo: illegal & risky or no, I've been there - no gas sometimes meant not getting to school/work; hated that so I started (slowly) digging out of the financial Pit. However, please be careful relying on that float as with gas hitting $3/gal, many of the pay@pumps are now authorizing anywhere from $25-$100 (even on credit cards). I see these all the time when my customers call in wondering where their funds went. Also, alot of banks have removed the float from their debit cards.

@ all: eStatements are fine - if on a secure site & you d/l'm to the backup storage system of your choice. forget that part & you will get hit with statement copy fees at most banks as they tend to think if you fail to keep the free copy you deserve the fee.

@Charybdis: It's called floating, and it's illegal. really? has someone notified the banks that floating is illegal? it's an integral part of their business model.

Paper fees, isnt that paid by all the information the bank sells to its associates to provide you with "better" service.

POS fees, dont the actual POS's pay that fee to actually use the charging system, thats why there is usually a $10 min limit for credit card use...

@shdwsclan: POS fees are generally charged on DEBIT purchases (PINned), not CREDIT (signed). that is b/c the ATM processing bank charges banks a fee to process the transaction.

& there is no such thing as a credit card minimum. merchants charging this are violating their merchant agreements with the cc companies.

@mac-phisto:

Spending money you do not currently possess is illegal. Keep in mind that floating is a separate legal entity from buying on credit, which is considered a loan. It makes no difference what the banks do or don't do, if you so much as write a check when you don't have the funds to cover it then and there you're in the wrong.

That doesn't mean people don't do it, and I'm as guilty as anyone else of relying on float at times. But people need to be aware that this is not something they're entitled to, it's a quirk of the system that may be 'corrected' at any time. Just like with Check 21 - it was simply making it harder for people to do what they had already agreed not to do in the first place. They just didn't bother reading that part of the agreement.

Oh, that's a brilliant little cartoon. Anyone know where it's from?

Oh, never mind. I'm blind and ignorant. Excuse me.

It appears that the ATM fees for running your debit card as a debit are coming out of the merchant fees. I know where I work, we pay Mastercard, Visa, AMEX and Discover a fee for each of their cards we run, but a single flat fee for the privilege of being able to run debit cards. We don't charge our customers for that, but the banks do, and there are fewer protections in place than with a credit card transaction.

Hence, when I train cashiers, they're taught to ALWAYS ask before running something as a debit card.

@a_m_m_b: You're far better off getting a gas card and paying it off every month. My husband and I have been doing that since the major hurricanes a couple of years ago made gas prices go insane in the area, and we've never had to worry about whether the money's there any given day we need the gas, or which budget lines we need to move around because some butterfly sneezed in Guam, causing gas prices to jump again. We just gas up, go, and pay it off when the bill comes.

A security expert actually wants paper mailed to his/her house where it can be stolen or lost in transit? Wow. I'm a security expert, too, and I get every statement possible sent electronically (they don't send the statement, they just send notification that it's available, you download the statement if you want it). If you want a paper trail, you print the .pdf file. Not even my mailman knows where I bank, much less anybody who gets my mail by mistake (which happens frequently in my neighborhood) or mail theft. Paper with your bank information all over it is exactly what you *don't* want floating around!

Silly Consumerist, Paisley is a pattern, not a color.

I've been a victim of this today!! I deposited my money on may 25th, 2007 and had also assigned my checks to clear on the 25th of may, well my dumbass accidentally deposited the money in my savings and had to transfer it to my checking today. When i look at my account i had 7 overdraft items. i had 260 in my account on friday and they cleared the biggest check first which let them charge me 7 times overdraft fees on small transactions. AND 4 of those small transactions were made on the 23rd when i had money in my account yet it cleared on the 25th and they hit me with overdraft fees each of
$35 for a 5 dollar transaction made on the 23rd. i called the bank and they said they wouldnt at least waive the transactions made before the 25th. the bank was BANK OF AMERICA, I understand that it was partially my fault but they do this to get more money out of your account . Its unethical and unfair. Im sure they clear the biggest check for our "convience" yea right they do it to make more money. so now I've paid 500 dollars in the transactions that cleared and the overdrafted fees altogether.