During the brouhaha over the $5-a-month debit card usage fee, this article came to my attention: Banking Has Become an Oligopoly Instead of a Competitive Business. It said banking is now an oligopoly, and therefore switching banks will not work because banks are not in a competitive market. “Banking is not really a competitive industry. […]
Free Credit Score After Credit Application
I wrote several times on this blog I don’t care much about credit scores. Most people shouldn’t either because they have a good enough score that will give them the best rates anyway. Improving a good enough score doesn’t really make a difference. I don’t buy my credit scores. Nor do I give my Social […]
Irrational Sensitivity to Service Price Increases
I wrote about people’s irrational sensitivity to gas prices some time ago. This time I’m writing about people’s irrational sensitivity to service price increases. In each case, we are not talking about a lot of money. There are values behind each service. Still, people complain vehemently about the price increases. Debit Card Fees News came […]
Mysterious Check In the Mail
I owed a friend some money for some shared expenses. I used Fidelity’s online bill payment service to pay him because he doesn’t have a PayPal account and I was too lazy to find an envelope and a stamp. A few weeks passed and I still don’t see the check hitting my account. Fidelity uses […]
Banks Automatically Renew Matured CDs
I first heard this from Jonathan at My Money Blog about two years ago. Many banks automatically renew matured CDs to the same term. You only have a very short window — a few days — to stop that. If you miss the window, you are subject to the early withdrawal penalty on the new […]
US Treasury Banks With Bank of America
I know many people complain about Bank of America. I saw this stamp on the back of the check I wrote for my 2010 federal income tax. Apparently the IRS took my check and deposited it in US Treasury’s account with Bank of America. It makes Bank of America true to its name.
Free Sales Tax Or Free Financing
I heard on the radio an ad from a mattress store. It says for this weekend only, the store will either pay the sales tax on any mattress purchase or give free financing for 24 months. Suppose the price of the mattress is $1,000 and the sales tax is 8% (to make math easier), if […]
Fort Knox Federal Credit Union Changes Terms On Existing CDs
This is not an April Fool’s joke. Ken at DepositAccounts.com reported yesterday that a credit union in Kentucky is reneging the terms on its existing CDs. Fort Knox Federal Credit Union told customers the early withdrawal penalty on their CDs will go up from 3 months to 6 months. The change affects not only new […]
How to Do a Free Wire Transfer
The most commonly used method to transfer money is by ACH. It’s typically an overnight process, although some banks make it slower than others. There’s technically international ACH, but I haven’t seen it offered to consumers. If you need the money transferred sooner or if you are transferring money to a different country, you can […]
Credit Card Concierge Service: Free and Helpful
Credit card companies keep inflating the status of their cards. 20 years ago a Gold card was something worth bragging about. Now everybody gets at least a Platinum card. Look at the credit cards in your wallet. Chances are you have a Visa Signature or MasterCard World card. These cards come with a free concierge […]
Debit Card Fee Caps: Nothing to Fear
Back in December, the Federal Reserve proposed rules to cap debit card interchange fees at 12 cents per transaction. Currently banks charge the retailers (called “merchants” in the industry) on average 56 cents per transaction for a signature debit and 23 cents per transaction for a PIN debit. If the proposed rules become the final […]
You Pay Me Interest, I Pay You Fees
Bank fees were in the news again a few weeks ago when Bank of America announced it will take a $10 billion charge for anticipated lower fee revenue as it abandoned overdraft fees from debit card transactions. Back in September New York Times personal finance columnist Ron Lieber wrote that maybe customers will be willing […]