Sep 9, 2009 5:45 pm US/Eastern
Curious About Check Cashing Fees
BOSTON (WBZ) ―
A lot of our viewers are telling us they're angry about paying bank fees.
And there's one fee in particular that has been a big topic on our
web site.
Deb from Scituate asks:
"I'd like to know why Bank of America is charging people $6 to cash a paycheck drawn on their own bank?"
Bill from Wakefield says:
"Is that legal? Can they charge a fee to cash one of their own checks?"
Well as we found out, it's legal, but some people say it isn't right.
HOW IT WORKS
"I consider it very unfair," says Mark Rugani.
He's an art student working this summer as a landscaper, making a few bucks for college.
His weekly paycheck is drawn on his employer's Bank of America account.
But each week when he takes his paycheck to the Bank of America's Cohasset branch here's what happens.
"As soon as I reach the teller to cash it she asks for my ID to make sure I am who I am, but she also tells me there's a $6 fee to go with it," says Rugani.
He's charged the fee and fingerprinted.
That's the price Mark pays for not having an account with Bank of America.
For Mark that means $6 every week.
"That's pretty close to an hour's pay," he says.
A lot of you wrote to us about this.
There's
Melissa from Quincy,
George from Danvers,
Denny from Charlestown and
Susan from Hubbardston.
They all had the same experience and the same complaint.
What does the bank have to say?
They wouldn't talk to us on-camera, but sent us this statement:
"Bank of America began instituting check cashing fees more than 8 years ago to improve customer satisfaction, help prevent fraud and offset costs for providing this service to people that were not the banks' customers."
But Deirdre Cummings, a consumer advocate with
Masspirg doesn't buy it.
"It's an aggressive way to say, hey, if you're not going to come in and bank with us, we don't even want to cash your check," she says.
Cummings has worked on banking issues in Massachusetts for 15 years.
She says the bank isn't doing anything illegal or even against the rules, but she blames this fee and many others on the consolidation of the banking industry where smaller banks were bought up by the big boys.
"So we have a less competitive market," says Cummings.
And, she says, that means we pay fees that we didn't pay not too long ago.
"They essentially do it because they can. A lot of consumers don't have a lot of alternatives to go to," says Cummings.
HOW TO AVOID THE FEE
The only thing you can do to avoid this particular fee is either open a Bank of America account, or take your check to another bank where you do have an account.
But you'll have to wait a day or two for your check to clear so you can get your money.
You can also work with your employer to see if they'll switch to a bank that will cash your paychecks for free.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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