-
Bank fees have reached record highs this year, according to a fall survey from Bankrate.
September 30 -
Free checking accounts may be on the wane, but a majority of Americans still pay no monthly service fees, according to a survey from the American Bankers Association.
August 26 -
Free checking accounts are on the wane at traditional banks, according to a MoneyRates.com survey released Monday. But customers can still avoid monthly maintenance fees at a majority of online banks.
August 20
RBS Citizens on Tuesday unveiled free checking with no monthly fee or minimum balance requirement as long as the customer makes one deposit a month of any amount.
Free checking is a major reversal for Citizens, which had
The new "One Deposit Checking" account can be opened with as little as $25, and is part of the Providence, R.I., bank's strategy to offer more products to checking account customers.
"We think this one is a game-changer because it's just so easy," says Brad Conner, vice chairman of consumer banking at RBS Citizens Financial Group, the holding company for the $130.1 billion-asset Citizens. "If you make one deposit, you will never pay a maintenance fee." (RBS Citizens is a subsidiary of the Royal Bank of Scotland.)
The percentage of large banks that
While the trend has been to do away with free checking, a handful of other banks, notably the $59 billion-asset
The $18.4 billion-asset TCF Financial (TCB) in Wayzata, Minn.,
Citizens said it will no longer offer its basic "Green" checking account that had charged a $9.99 monthly fee to new customers. The fee got waived if a customer made five transactions per month or maintained an average daily balance of $1,500.
The bank also launched another checking account called "Value Checking," with a fixed $3.99 monthly fee that includes designer checks, paper statements and one free out-of-network ATM transaction.
Citizens also will not charge overdraft fees for transactions of $5 or less on the new checking accounts.
