For those that think that it will only be FD that charge see comments from Nationwide

eslick

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/investing-and-markets/article.html?in_article_id=414717&in_page_id=3&ct=5

Quote "Philip Williamson, the outgoing chief executive of Nationwide, said: 'First Direct was another nail in the coffin of free banking. 'It does cost us money to run current accounts and depending what comes of the Office of Fair Trading's enquiry into overdrafts and how our competitors react, we will have to assess the situation. 'I don't think we can rule out charging for current accounts totally although we have no immediate plans to introduce such charges at the moment.'

Make a stand now, write to your bank and tell them that you dont agree with fee paying accounts for all. If you are FD customer close the accounts so that the market sits up and takes notice.

KTF

No bank is ever going to say that they will never introduce charges so thats the sort of generic reply all the banks will be putting out at the moment.

They will also be watching FD like a hawk so see what the fallout is.

oli4uk

The fallout will not just effect FD. Myself allong with several other HSBC customers I know have switched to A&L as of yesterday. HSBC has never been a good bank appart from being accessable, I get constantly bombarded by advertising, have poor interest rates with them and now a bank they own is charging £120 a year. We ae getting out now while we have a few months to make the transfer tidy

eslick

its coming, even if they wont admit it

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/saving-and-banking/article.html?in_article_id=414733&in_page_id=7

SparciaM

When all banks do start charging, u just switch to the one that has the best products and stuff for yourself. Why pay £10 just for a bank account, when atm you can pay £10 for an upgraded account with "extras"

Hazzanet

I have to say that I am a bit annoyed about all this. For the time being, yes we are safe, but if my bank starts charging a monthly fee, I'll be a bit peeved.

I've looked at some of the US banks to see how they charge, and it seems to be a minefield. Some accounts are free where a minimum balance is kept, otherwise a monthly service fee applies, others allow 10 free transactions a month (provided a certain monthly credit is made), and then charge per transaction, and then the rest just charge per transaction.

Taking the FD story, I couldn't keep a £1.5K balance OR credit £1.5K a month, so I'd have to pay the fee. Working against the US models, I see I'd also be paying fees... I certainly make more than 10 transactions a month... that wouldn't cover the Direct Debits alone!

I have to admit, I'd feel more comfortable paying a fee if I felt that I got something in return for it - e.g. The phone answered in 3 rings, free bankers drafts, discounts on other products. I'll have to see where the land lies if my bank(s) adopt a fee charging strategy.

In reality, I'd prefer not to pay fees to run my account - I'm happy to swallow 39 quid as a slap on the wrists for being naughty.

Hazza

Bossyboots

Hazzanet wrote:

I have to admit, I'd feel more comfortable paying a fee if I felt that I got something in return for it - e.g. The phone answered in 3 rings, free bankers drafts, discounts on other products.
Hazza

Maybe this is where consumers can bring the pressure to bear if fees come in. I am prepared at the moment to accept the low level of service I get from my bank in respect of my current account. Its free and convenient, I don't expect much from them. If they are going to charge for the service then they are going to have to pull their fingers out because I won't be so quiescent over something I pay for.

JohnPeard

I am not sure about all the merits of so called 'free banking'.

A bank has to make money out of trading to exist, and cannot possibly provide 'free banking' to all.

In practice, they have to make their profit by other means which inevitably results in a lack of transparency, tactics to entice one into debt, or making excessive and unfair charges elsewhere.

Why cannot banks simply make a 'per item' charge of say 50p for an authorized transaction and £1 for an unauthorized one.

For those on low incomes or bank turnover, they could waive the fee for the first 10 athzd. transactions per month and the first unathzd. one.

Everyone would know exactly where they stood, and how much the charges would be in advance.

amcluesent

>A bank has to make money out of trading to exist, and cannot possibly provide 'free banking' to all.<

On current accounts, the bank can make plenty of money by loaning to the market at one rate of interest and paying account holders a fraction of the interest received.

How much does a 'dormant' account cost to service, it's just a few bytes of information sitting on a computer disk and a fraction of a second to calculate the interest paid.

This is profiteering and shows that banking is still a cartel where cosy deals are done in the clubs off Pall Mall.

ckerrd

JohnPeard wrote:

I am not sure about all the merits of so called 'free banking'.

A bank has to make money out of trading to exist, and cannot possibly provide 'free banking' to all.

In practice, they have to make their profit by other means which inevitably results in a lack of transparency, tactics to entice one into debt, or making excessive and unfair charges elsewhere.

Why cannot banks simply make a 'per item' charge of say 50p for an authorized transaction and £1 for an unauthorized one.

For those on low incomes or bank turnover, they could waive the fee for the first 10 athzd. transactions per month and the first unathzd. one.

Everyone would know exactly where they stood, and how much the charges would be in advance.

I hope banks don't charge by transaction as we have a fair amount of comings ang goings, well mostly goings, in our account

Sapphire

ckerrd wrote:

I hope banks don't charge by transaction as we have a fair amount of comings ang goings, well mostly goings, in our account

50p for a transaction suggested above would be a huge amount to pay, given the amount of transactions I have! This suggestion must surely have come from an employee of Nationwide.

Nationwide gets enough profit from me already - it should not charge current-account holders. I'd leave them if they did this, particularly as their interest rates are sh*te, and now they appear to have had data on some 11 million customers stolen through their own idiocy as well!

They used to be a very good company - now they seem to be one of the worst. They must have some pretty lousy people managing the company at the moment. Shame that such a decent company has gone to pot.