Chase Your New Monthly Banking Fee

Former WaMu customers: “Formerly free checking” is the new black! Tipster Arne alerted us to the fact that if you were migrated to a Chase Total Checking account and have under $1,500 in it (or less than $5,000 across all your deposit accounts), they’ve begun charging a $12 per month fee. That’s $144 a year for the privilege of them holding onto your money for you. I believe you can ward off the fee by making a monthly direct deposit of at least $500.

This is not restricted to JP Morgan Chase, of course. As the Motley Fool helpfully recounts in ”Your Bank’s Latest Fee Shakedown“:

• Over at Bank of America (NYSE: BAC), you’ll pay $6 to $25 a month, depending on your account balances and the kinds of accounts you have with the company.
• A basic account at Citigroup (NYSE: C) runs $8 a month if you fail to transact with the bank at least five times a month. And for a less basic account, it’s $20 a month if your balance (in a single or multiple accounts) falls below $6,000.
• And at Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC), formerly free checking now costs new customers $5 a month, plus $6.95 for online bill payment privileges.

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You may also be interested to know that, as of February 8, 2011, if you withdraw money from a non-Chase ATM you’re going to pay the princely sum of $5 (up from $2), in addition to whatever that bank charges you to use the ATM. This is on top of our previous story about Chase handing off rolls of “quarters.” What does it take to get people to switch en masse to credit unions? Maybe this latest round of fees will offer clues.