I was trying to explain to some friends about saving bank fees on credit cards. They just didn’t get it.
These credit cards are ones that I can’t replace if I cancel them as I don’t meet the income levels anymore so I leave them open for emergency use and paying some bills as well as trades people but I do pay them off monthly so far haven’t paid any interest in 15 years just an annual fee.
I have more than one account both have annual fees around $30 each and they are No frills accounts. One account has a loop hole so that you don’t need to pay annual fee. If you spend and put on the credit card more than $1000 in one calendar year you don’t pay the fee for the next year. The first year was free to start with. So instead using my debit card to pay my bills I pay them with this credit card if it doesn’t have a fee for using a credit card as some firms do here. So I can charge some of my bills to this credit card then pay it off with a debit card in full. I just have to remember the annual starting date for this card. So if I pay my car bills with this credit card and any other transactions until this covers that $1000+each year thus saving the annual fee. It’s only a matter of paying it off each month which is the easy part as all these amounts are budgeted for and banked in my bill account. The way I look at it is $30 is better in my pocket than the banks. So I end up paying $30 annually in bank fees as I have worked out how to reduce banks fees all round.
Does your bank have any loop holes you could use? You may have to read the fine print on each account to find them.
They just didn’t get it.
July 25th, 2011 at 09:15 am
July 25th, 2011 at 02:13 pm 1311603221
I have always been able to have an account that charged no fees. At some point I became able to have a checking account that paid interest if I kept enough money in there, so that is where I/we kept some emergency funds.
When My DH was approaching retirement, he told the bank that his income was going down and that he didn't know if we could maintain the required amount in the account to keep it earning interest and no fee. Well, the banker said, "No problem, we'll let you keep the same benefits anyway," and just touched the keyboard a couple times, and it was done!
I was stunned. I had no idea a bank would ever make any kind of exception for us little folk. So besides reading the contractual terms, I guess one could always simply ask for a fee to be waived. If you don't ask, I'm sure you don't get.
Finally, I switched to a credit union, which in the US, is like a bank owned by the account holders. You actually buy shares and get a dividend, but also the interest charged on loans is used to pay out dividends on shares and interest on accounts. The greater economic good of the community is the goal of the credit union. I don't think there are any account fees at the credit unions.
July 25th, 2011 at 03:44 pm 1311608696
Maybe different in the states, but I have never had any troubles finding a bank account or credit card with absolutely no fees. So, I enjoy not having to jump through any hoops. I do shop around carefully and tend to bank with credit unions.