Investing

Insider Insight: Why Banks Keep Jacking Up ATM Fees

By Brad Tuttle | @bradrtuttle | March 18, 2011 | +

“You really don’t care if you piss off someone else’s customer.”

At some point, raising ATM fees has got to backfire and be bad for business, right? Not necessarily. This week, Chase announced pilot programs raising ATM fees to as much as $5 per transaction for non-customers.

In a DailyFinance story about the simultaneous disappearance of free checking and rise of ATM fees, Brian Foran, an analyst for Nomura Securities International, explained why banks have no qualms about jacking up these fees:

“You never make tons of money on ATM fees to non-customers, but the idea is you really don’t care if you piss off someone else’s customer,” Foran says.

What about pissing off your own customers by charging them for what until recently have been fee-free checking accounts?

MORE:
Consumer Study: Most Big Banks Get D Grades
Free Checking Becomes Fee Checking

Related Topics: ATM, ATM fees, banks, Chase, checking accounts, fees, Investing

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  • imhhandyman

    Do what is reccomended by Suze Ormand get a credit ca24d account from an acredidated credit union where the interest is legaly capped at 18% maximum by law skip the high dollar banks that tag you for unlimited rates and lots of times the interest rates there are higher for savings there as long as they are a part of the {NCUA] your just as assured as safe keeping as the FDIC its backed by federal govenment too.
    Let that big bank learn that to be profitable is nice but to rip off people in the process is immoral and not condusive to good public relations. The CEO that pushes this should loose any bonus for using gouging as a method for Maximum return on a minimal service. the Bank is using atm’s to dodge payment of an income to a bank teller for 24 hour 7 day a week of labor so its dodging a few thousand dollars a month charging 5 dollars for free labor from the customer doing the manual input that the teller would of produced and cost that bank

  • http://ximenej10.wordpress.com ximenej

    It really doesn’t make sense. Banks charge people to move there own money, loosing costumers, and invest hundreds to gain new costumers. Would it be easy just to give good service to all?

  • atm0spheric

    Quote:
    “You never make tons of money on ATM fees to non-customers, but the idea is you really don’t care if you piss off someone else’s customer,” Foran says.

    In my experience this sort of macho management style is usually a sign of an organisation heading for trouble.

    It’s not a good idea to piss anybody off – especially potential customers who think your ATM is in a convenient location.

    It always pays to be nicer than your competitors – especially if they are the victims of an excessively macho management.

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