Thank Walmart for Your New Bank Card Fee

The Washington Examiner ^ | 2 October 2011 | Timothy P. Carney

[huldah1776]

"standard tale of government intervention" at its best.

[upchuck]

Bank of America’s debit card fee will be a bonanza for credit unions.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Walmart attempted to become its own bank in order to alleviate fees to Citi, which does nothing to earn them.

Citi makes more on some products than Walmart does.

Citi did not want to lose its gravy train, so it demagogued Walmart's application and got it rejected.

So Walmart did an end-around.

I don't blame them.

[woodenickel]

Time to get out the old checkbook.

[Psycho_Bunny]

There’s some pretty muddled thinking going on in the authors head.

[The Free Engineer]

I suppose the next shoe to drop is retailers will start to refuse credit cards and take only debit.

[dawn53]

Guess you haven’t heard...fees on checking accounts are increasing too.

http://blog.al.com/businessnews/2011/10/checking_fees_continue_to_rise.html

[cowtowney]

good post. I agree

[bgill]

Total hogwash. It started and ended with the banks charging the stores. It’s the banks who want to fill their big pockets by charging both the stores and the card holders. High interest rates, fees, and extra charges every time you turn around and now they’re throwing in yet another charge. Here’s hoping BofA lose so many customers it puts them out of business.

[Vinnie]

Bank of America’s debit card fee will be a bonanza for credit unions.

I'm in the process of doing exactly that to Wells Fargo.

[deport]

Cash, checks and credit cards don’t have a fee per transaction yet, do they?

[throwback]

If their cards will even be accepted. Because CUs and small banks aren’t subject to this regulation, their switching fee can be what they currently are; nearly twice the price fixed rate. That means a merchant has to pay 40 cents to swipe that CU card vs. 20 cents for BOFA. Will the merchant eat the bigger fee on the small bank card because he makes it up on the artificially government fixed one; we’ll see? When government forces someone to give a free lunch, the cost just shifts to someone else - ALWAYS. If everyone piles into small banks to avoid the debit card fee, they’ll have to change the regulation to cover them too. The system is not static.

[Oberon]

Who are they trying to kid? It’s the customer who pays the fee no matter what... whether it goes through the bank or retailer, it’s just a matter of who handles the money.

[rottndog]

Total hogwash. It started and ended with the banks charging the stores.

So...the banks should just provide a service to the stores for free? The banks should just provide a service to YOU the consumer for free?

[tnlibertarian]

"standard tale of government intervention" at its best.

Exactly. Why blame Walmart and lobbyists? They're doing what they are supposed to do: try to make money for their companies. Blame the politicians willing to be bought. I laugh when politicians blame lobbyists for troubles in politics. If politicians weren't bribable, unethical, lying scum, lobbyists would be powerless.

[SouthTexas]

Mine does, actually used to get a rebate for using the card over checks.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Good post!

[bgill]

You're being ridiculous and you know it. Nothing wrong with charging fees to use the card however the banks are burning the candle at both ends. At one end, they're charging the stores. At the other, they're charging the cardholder outlandish fees and 25% interest rates. If you went down to the bank to get a personal loan and they told you it'd be 25% interest plus another charge for the privilege of using their bank, plus large late fees, and heck why not a charge for sending in your payment along with a charge to whatever entity you needed the loan for, what would you do? Any sane person would tell the bank where to stick their loan. You'd get better interest rates and fees from Sly the Loan Shark. But if you're happy with BofA charging a $5 fee every time you bought a $1 pack of gum, then that's your choice.

[ken21]

citi just sent me a letter saying that it is going to charge $20.00 per month for the account.

problem is, it was a calfed free account when citi bought calfed. the state approved the sale as long as the free accounts remained free.

[rottndog]

But if you're happy with BofA charging a $5 fee every time you bought a $1 pack of gum, then that's your choice.

You're right...it would be my choice. Just as it's your choice whether or not to use BofA. It's BofA's choice to charge whatever they want. I don't care if BofA charged $10 per transaction and %50 interest rates. I simply choose not to use them. So would the vast majority of consumers.

Funny how you bitch about BofA, when it's Walmart and the other retailers who are pocketing that money. When the gubmint limited what banks could charge, YOU didn't and won't see that money in the form of lower prices. BTW...in fairness to BofA, the $5 fee is not per transaction--at least you can be honest here.