Three Bucks for an ATM? Banks Gotta Make Money Somehow I Guess
Aggravating…yet you quickly think to yourself, "What do you think, pal? I’ve got my kids standing here pulling at my leg to hurry up so we can move on with our day. Do you really think I’m going to run all over town to find a free cash machine? Get it over with, take your darn fee and just give me my cash!"
It’s a typical scenario repeated countless thousands of times per day, all over the world, as consumers pay the price for convenience. How big of a price is being paid? ATM income to banks is estimated to be around $4.2 billion per year…that’s a hefty load of cash. And although banks have made literally billions of dollars on ATM fees over the years, faced with cut throat competition and growing consumer discontent over rising ATM fees, some banks are trying a new strategy…not charging the fees at all.
So with interest rates on the rise, making profit margins slim for banks–how can they afford to do such a thing? The answer is that owners of the free networks will be charging your bank, instead of charging you…and hoping that the increased use of their machines will help to offset the loss of fee income from the consumer themselves. Smaller banks and credit unions in particular are willing to pay some fees to large free network operators, because the cost of building, maintaining and servicing ATM machines themselves would be so great. Even keeping the machines constantly loaded with cash has become increasingly expensive, factoring in the climbing cost of gasoline needed to power the vehicles that courier the cash out to the machines on a regular basis. This plan very well could be a win-win for everyone, but most importantly, could help keep those extra bucks in your own wallet…where they belong. If you’re frugal/conservative/cheap, like me, you can find free ATMs at either www.moneypass.com, or www.allpointnetwork.com.
Realtor, Marathon Man, "Man of a Thousand Voices".
Allpoint.com goes to a real estate site… maybe it’s .net or .org ??
Ah, my bad — the correct address is http://www.allpointnetwork.com…Ed