Finding a bank today that does not charge fees is a difficult task. There are fewer and fewer and multiple factors come into play, such as the type of financial product, the link to the entity or the settlement date. What fees are the banks charging?
From the start, the most common commissions for which they usually charge us are for maintenance or overdraft in a bank account; issuance and maintenance of cards, and also when making transfers. Against the latter, we could fight by withdrawing the money and putting it ourselves directly into the account to which we wanted to make the transfer. Of course, until the Bizum arrived and saved our lives. Since then, transfers have been forgotten.
But it is true that the replacement of the Bizum by the transfer has saved us to a certain extent, since there is a monthly limit that cannot be exceeded. With bank accounts, it is another story. In fact, there are certain periods of the year that are commonly known for the update of the commissions for maintenance of the checking account. The last was in June and now in september the equation repeats itself, especially for those customers who have less ties to the financial institution.
In general, most banks used to require always having the payroll domiciled in order not to charge commissions to customers. However, these measures have been tightened in some of them. So much so that now it is demanded have a greater linkage in some banks with actions like:
- Contract other products such as mortgages, loans, investment funds, pension plans or insurance, among others
- Having an minimum balance amount in the account
- Doing credit card purchases for a certain amount or make a minimum of movements within the term set by the entity
Hence now there is three degrees of relationship with the entity:
- Total bonding: banks do not charge any commission
- Medium bonding: not all banks have this type of link, but those that do, charge commissions that are between 60 and 120 euros per year
- No bonding: banks charge commissions ranging from 45 to 240 euros per year
Source: prepared by Roams from the different entities.
You can get more information here If you want to know how some banks charge you commissions.
According to the Association of Financial Users (Asufin), the financial entities that have increased their commissions the most are Banco Santander, Ibercaja and Kutxabank, which have started to charge € 96, € 48 and € 40 more respectively compared to the previous year.
Of course, you can still find banks without maintenance fees. Normally, most of them are those that operate online, among which are Imagin, Openbank, Selfbank, Wizink, EVO Banco or the neobanks Bnext and N26.