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If you have a large sum of money to place somewhere, JPM is not the place anymore. Apparently they are trying to discourage deposits that might flee during uncertain times.
From the article:"The plan won’t affect the bank’s retail customers"
Not yet anyway. I have read that some banks are shortening the time period of inactive accounts. I think Chase is either 18 or 24 months now. The winds of change are blowing.
Yes, and First Republic is similar to Schwab as far as benefits. All three have branches within one block of us, and we have accounts at all three. Chase because they took over an old Home Savings branch which has safe-deposit boxes, free with a minimum balance, and also because that's where our retirement checks are sent and it's more trouble than it's worth to change all of that. Electronic transfer setup between Chase and Schwab for investments. Manual pedestrian and email setups to deal with First Republic.
Wells Fargo & BofA have offices within one block also, but we refuse to deal with either of them on ethical grounds. A history factoid: BofA was the transmogrification of the Bank of Italy, which was started here in SF during the 1800's. The Bank of Italy was highly thought of, but can't say the same for BofA. Considering the history, it's odd that the word most often associated with BofA would suggest lack of proper parentage, but that wasn't the case.
@Old_Joe - West Portal? Do they still have a neighborhood ban on new financial institutions? It looks like even Sterling Bank popped up there not too long ago.
Hey there, @msf- yep, West Portal for sure. My wife doesn't drive, so we tried very hard many years ago to locate here because of the excellent Muni transportation. We almost never drive downtown... walk 2 blocks to the tunnel and you're downtown in 12 or 15 minutes, for 75 cents! I do believe that there is still a ban on any more banks, at least.
From the article:"The plan won’t affect the bank’s retail customers"
Not yet anyway. I have read that some banks are shortening the time period of inactive accounts. I think Chase is either 18 or 24 months now. The winds of change are blowing.
The way that the average person is going to bank is going to change rapidly over the next 5-10 years (or probably even sooner.) There will be less in the way of bank branches and more in the way of new services that will attract the average retail customer tired of paying fees (and who, in many cases, are probably unprofitable for the banks.)
The credit card companies want to attract the unbanked or underbanked with services like Amex's Bluebird. Diebold is creating booths where you deal with a virtual teller and if you need help you can have someone in a center somewhere talk to you.
Regulations are resulting in banks having to make it difficult for certain large customers to have their deposits there and small customers are leaving for other services. I'm not sure what the major banks are going to be in the future, although I'm sure they will figure a way to continue to have the government cater to their every whim.
I don't begrudge banks for imposing inactivity fees, so long as the time frame and amounts are reasonable. They do incur costs to hold small, virtually abandoned accounts, and it often doesn't make sense for the account holder to have these little accounts floating around all over. (I assume they're small accounts, because if they were larger, the chances are that money's being used.)
There are at least a couple of places where the practice does become annoying, and I'm dealing with both of them. One is where the bank requires an account for a service or benefit. It seems to me that so long as you are taking advantage of the linked service, that ought to keep them happy. For example, maintaining (and accessing) a safe deposit box, or a linked brokerage account.
I'm using a regional bank for a safe deposit box (requiring payment from a linked account), and they've implemented an 89-day inactivity fee. At least they make it easy to avoid - just get your balance via automated phone every couple of months.
But then there's Wells Fargo - WellsTrade + PMA checking account (for free trades). No inactivity fee for that combo, but they declare the PMA account "dormant" if you don't use it for one year. That used to be okay - call them up and reactivate it. But now, if you don't send them a written request via USPS within a month of "dormancy", they freeze the account for two years and then send it to your home state's office of unclaimed funds (escheatment).
They say that they need that 22 month lead time to "allow [them] processing time". That's in writing from Wells Fargo.
"But then there's Wells Fargo - WellsTrade + PMA checking account (for free trades). No inactivity fee for that combo, but they declare the PMA account "dormant" if you don't use it for one year. That used to be okay - call them up and reactivate it. But now, if you don't send them a written request via USPS within a month of "dormancy", they freeze the account for two years and then send it to your home state's office of unclaimed funds (escheatment). "
Daaaaang. That's a very harsh thing to do. They could easily charge fees instead of taking that approach.
Followup on Wells Fargo - this is something I've been trying to resolve for a month. I finally got someone good to talk with there. (That seems to happen sometimes, if one keeps trying.) He appreciated the issues, told me he would check it out and get back to me in an hour or so. He did, and we had a very pleasant 15-20 minute conversation.
So I want to give credit where it is due.
WF does have a one year inactivity freeze ("dormancy") policy on checking accounts. That's not unreasonable - it is a way to coax people to say that they're still around, and less costly to customers than using an inactivity fee as a stick. (There are other reasons the bank does this, but it's not something I find onerous.)
The problem is that you can't just call them up and "thaw" the account. At least you can't if you live in some states. Last year I could. It seems that the rule my state changed last year was that in order to unfreeze an account, the bank must be notified in writing or in person. A phone call isn't sufficient. Again, I can see some sense here - if an account has been inactive for a long time, you want to be very careful that a charlatan hasn't come along to swipe the account.
WF's automatically generated form letter didn't take this into account. So, while it correctly said the account was frozen and that they needed writing to unfreeze it, it got the timing all wrong. One can unfreeze the account almost anytime - they don't hold the money in limbo for two years before escheating it to the state.
If you live in most states and you get frozen by WF, all it should take is a phone call to straighten things out. It was the notification rules that changed in my state, not the sequence or timing of event.
Comments
(Old account from Coast Savings
Derf
Minimum balance required to avoid charges, high fees for global atm use, ( mine is close to $9.00 per transaction).
Compare to Schwab Bank. No minimums, fee free atm use. Fees get refunded at the end of the month. Interest on balance,
Wells Fargo & BofA have offices within one block also, but we refuse to deal with either of them on ethical grounds. A history factoid: BofA was the transmogrification of the Bank of Italy, which was started here in SF during the 1800's. The Bank of Italy was highly thought of, but can't say the same for BofA. Considering the history, it's odd that the word most often associated with BofA would suggest lack of proper parentage, but that wasn't the case.
I have heard some good things about Umpqua but they sure have grown since the crisis, taking over weaker banks.
Found a link. http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2013/09/umpqua_bank_purchase_of_sterli.html
The credit card companies want to attract the unbanked or underbanked with services like Amex's Bluebird. Diebold is creating booths where you deal with a virtual teller and if you need help you can have someone in a center somewhere talk to you.
Regulations are resulting in banks having to make it difficult for certain large customers to have their deposits there and small customers are leaving for other services. I'm not sure what the major banks are going to be in the future, although I'm sure they will figure a way to continue to have the government cater to their every whim.
There are at least a couple of places where the practice does become annoying, and I'm dealing with both of them. One is where the bank requires an account for a service or benefit. It seems to me that so long as you are taking advantage of the linked service, that ought to keep them happy. For example, maintaining (and accessing) a safe deposit box, or a linked brokerage account.
I'm using a regional bank for a safe deposit box (requiring payment from a linked account), and they've implemented an 89-day inactivity fee. At least they make it easy to avoid - just get your balance via automated phone every couple of months.
But then there's Wells Fargo - WellsTrade + PMA checking account (for free trades). No inactivity fee for that combo, but they declare the PMA account "dormant" if you don't use it for one year. That used to be okay - call them up and reactivate it. But now, if you don't send them a written request via USPS within a month of "dormancy", they freeze the account for two years and then send it to your home state's office of unclaimed funds (escheatment).
They say that they need that 22 month lead time to "allow [them] processing time". That's in writing from Wells Fargo.
Daaaaang. That's a very harsh thing to do. They could easily charge fees instead of taking that approach.
Unclaimed property search (state by state):
unclaimed.org/
Multi-state search:
missingmoney.com/
So I want to give credit where it is due.
WF does have a one year inactivity freeze ("dormancy") policy on checking accounts. That's not unreasonable - it is a way to coax people to say that they're still around, and less costly to customers than using an inactivity fee as a stick. (There are other reasons the bank does this, but it's not something I find onerous.)
The problem is that you can't just call them up and "thaw" the account. At least you can't if you live in some states. Last year I could. It seems that the rule my state changed last year was that in order to unfreeze an account, the bank must be notified in writing or in person. A phone call isn't sufficient. Again, I can see some sense here - if an account has been inactive for a long time, you want to be very careful that a charlatan hasn't come along to swipe the account.
WF's automatically generated form letter didn't take this into account. So, while it correctly said the account was frozen and that they needed writing to unfreeze it, it got the timing all wrong. One can unfreeze the account almost anytime - they don't hold the money in limbo for two years before escheating it to the state.
If you live in most states and you get frozen by WF, all it should take is a phone call to straighten things out. It was the notification rules that changed in my state, not the sequence or timing of event.