Thin end of the wedge

[red750]

An Aussie bank customer has been left outraged after they were charged $7.50 to withdraw their own cash at an ATM in Queensland. 

 

A photo of the whopping fee at a NAB branch in Townsville was shared to social media on Sunday, with hundreds of Aussies slamming the charge.

 

 

Meanwhile, Bendigo Bank has quietly introduced a fee for customers wanting to withdraw money from branches.

 

Australia's sixth-largest bank will now charge $2.50 for over-the-counter branch withdrawals.

 

[onetrack]

I've got a better story than that. I bought a good used lathe at a Grays auction in S.A. about 10 years ago. It was bought for my stepdaughters boyfriend, she paid me in cash, and I used my credit card to purchase it - because you need a credit card to buy anything from auction houses.

 

Grays contacted me a week later and told me their operator had dropped the lathe in the process of loading it onto my arranged transport - and it was beyond repair, and they would refund the money. 

 

So they refunded my credit card. But I'd already paid the card down, and their refund put the card into credit.

So I went to a teller to draw out the surplus cash to return it to my SD - and the bank (it was HSBC) charged me a "cash advance fee" of $25!! - to get my OWN cash out of the account!!

I wasn't going into debit with the cash withdrawal, the balance was zero, after the cash withdrawal!

 

So went into HSBC and tore a new one for the teller, and closed the credit card account, telling them I would NEVER deal with HSBC again, as long as I live! - and I haven't.

She was quite apologetic and upset when I told her what had happened, and why I was closing the account - but made NO attempt to call any manager, nor did anyone ever offer to refund the (totally illegal) $25 charge.

 

HSBC is the bank that got fined US$1.9B (plus US$665M in civil penalties) in the U.S. courts, for money laundering for Mexican drug cartels -

Got fined 57.3 million POUNDS ($73M) for "serious failings" in customers deposit protection in the U.K. -

Got fined 6.2 million POUNDS ($7.9M)over treatment of customers in financial difficulty in the U.K. -

And, is currently being sued by ASIC for failing to stop Australian HSBC customers accounts being stripped by scammers. 

 

My conclusion is that HSBC is amongst the biggest scammers in the world. 

[facthunter]

Banks are the ROBBERS and it's their Loyal customers they rob. Loyalty means nothing. New customers get better deals. Look at the Money Bank CEOS are Paid.. Compare that to what the Prime Minister gets.   Nev

[spacesailor]

Like " Macquarie bank " ceo. $ 53 million annually. 

Then a " golden handshake " .after it made headlines. 

His replacement gets only $ 25 million for her annuity .

$25 millions is still to much .

spacesailor

[facthunter]

 When you say things like that, Hockey "Smokin Joe" says it's politics of ENVY. . Trickle down is  a deceit.  How do they Look in the mirror and say I DESERVE WHAT I'M PAID. AS I've said before THEY live in another world.  Nev

[rgmwa]

2 hours ago, onetrack said:

I've got a better story than that. I bought a good used lathe at a Grays auction in S.A. about 10 years ago. It was bought for my stepdaughters boyfriend, she paid me in cash, and I used my credit card to purchase it - because you need a credit card to buy anything from auction houses.

 

Grays contacted me a week later and told me their operator had dropped the lathe in the process of loading it onto my arranged transport - and it was beyond repair, and they would refund the money. 

 

So they refunded my credit card. But I'd already paid the card down, and their refund put the card into credit.

So I went to a teller to draw out the surplus cash to return it to my SD - and the bank (it was HSBC) charged me a "cash advance fee" of $25!! - to get my OWN cash out of the account!!

I wasn't going into debit with the cash withdrawal, the balance was zero, after the cash withdrawal!

 

So went into HSBC and tore a new one for the teller, and closed the credit card account, telling them I would NEVER deal with HSBC again, as long as I live! - and I haven't.

She was quite apologetic and upset when I told her what had happened, and why I was closing the account - but made NO attempt to call any manager, nor did anyone ever offer to refund the (totally illegal) $25 charge.

 

HSBC is the bank that got fined US$1.9B (plus US$665M in civil penalties) in the U.S. courts, for money laundering for Mexican drug cartels -

Got fined 57.3 million POUNDS ($73M) for "serious failings" in customers deposit protection in the U.K. -

Got fined 6.2 million POUNDS ($7.9M)over treatment of customers in financial difficulty in the U.K. -

And, is currently being sued by ASIC for failing to stop Australian HSBC customers accounts being stripped by scammers. 

 

My conclusion is that HSBC is amongst the biggest scammers in the world. 

I got caught like that once. Had a credit balance on my credit card, withdrew some of it on-line to pay into another account and immediately got hit with a $20 or $25 fee. That was NAB or Westpac. Can't remember which. Never did that again. I'll bet they all do it. 

[Jerry_Atrick]

F! Me.. Those bank fees over there are expensive.. Over here, the only fee I have to take my money is (as opposed to borrowing whether intention or not)... well.. there are none. It's illegal.. I think maybe there is a fee for terminating a term deposit, but it is not huge and can only be on the basis of reasonable cost.

 

Also, over here, we have things called ISAs (Individual Savings Accounts). For adults it allows you to deposit up to £20K/year in cash and equities on permitted markets (European, US, Canada - not sure about Aus), and any returns are tax free. OK nothing to do with the banks per se, and they are sneaky as the returns are lower than fully taxed accounts (something I have personally taken up with the regulator as there is no cost difference to the banks), but shows what can happen if a government wants things to work for the consumer and betterment of the economy (yes, typically lower income people can't afford to deposit as much as higher income people).

 

I haven't checked the Aussie retail banking scene lately, but would have thought with all the fintech around, someone would work out that you could make a killing by going techhie and not charging all those fees. But, there is consumer intertia - too hard or too lazy to change banks, which the oldies rely on.

 

2 hours ago, onetrack said:

My conclusion is that HSBC is amongst the biggest scammers in the world. 

I think at the retail and small commercial level, it seems from the above, the Aussie banking sector is amongst the biggest scammers in the world - and governments of both stripes  don't do much to curtail it. I am definitely keeping my UK accounts when I move to Aus.

 

Geez, with all those charges, I am surprised cash is still not king, take what you need for the month out on payday and don't incur any other fees.. Of course, it shows what people are willing to pay for convenience when there is no real competition (I would almost assert a cartel). @octave - ISTR you use your credit cards to pay for everything and clear them monthly.. What charges, if any do you pay as a result (I know the CC gives you something like 30 or 55 days interest free)?

 

With respect to HSBC, look up HSBC deferred prosecution agreements on the internet and you will see a few. But, alas, they are not the only ones; any of the bug European and US players have them.. as no doubt many others. I subscribe to various regulators' news feeds, and there is nary a day where there isn't an announcement of one of the major global players being fined for something. Some of it is genuine incompetence or the result of failing to control an organisation with too many tentacles; Some of it is malicous. Oddly, Aussie regulators are still not high on the number of enforecement stories that I receive.

Edited Tuesday at 08:45 AM by Jerry_Atrick

[octave]

42 minutes ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

ISTR you use your credit cards to pay for everything and clear them monthly.. What charges, if any do you pay as a result (I know the CC gives you something like 30 or 55 days interest free)?

The only fees I can see on my statement are a couple of international transaction fees for some items bought from overseas.  The card I have (Mastercard Platinum) has 44 days of interest-free and we usually pay it off every Friday.  The card has a yearly fee of $50 but this is more than offset by rewards points that we use for Bunnings vouchers (about 4x$50 per year) some merchants occasionally charge extra fees but most businesses don't seem to.  If I were to pay my rates with a credit card there would be a couple of dollars surcharge which seems irrelevant  on the sort of amount however I usually would such bills by bank transfer.

 

When it comes to banking we also don't pay any fees.  We bank with Bank Australia which is a customer-owned bank. Whilst other banks are mainly concerned with pleasing the shareholders with this bank the customers are the shareholders. Whilst we don't pay any bank fees the bank does have some fees but we are able to avoid them.

 

https://www.bankaust.com.au/banking/everyday-accounts/everyday-account-rates-and-fees#Basic-Access

 

 

I think the banks with unreasonable fees rely on people's reluctance to shop around. 

 

 

Edited Tuesday at 09:24 AM by octave

[red750]

1 hour ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

F! Me.. Those bank fees over there are expensive.

They just about charge a fee for letting you walk through the door. More and more branches are no longer handling cash over the counter. You have to use the ATM. However, they keep removing ATMs, leaving you to use privately operated ATMs, which charge a fee. You can draw cash at a post office, but I think they charge fees as well.

 

Your pension is paid into your bank account by direct deposit. You use your debit card for store purchases, and pay bills by bPay, direct debit or EFT. You can draw a few dollars in cash at the register in major supermarkets, but you must make a purchase to do so. Some accounts are charged a fee for these withdrawals, but the CBA has a specific type of account for pensioners which is exempt from that fee. Like you say, major scammers.

[onetrack]

I'm a big user today of customer-owned banks. They are normally former Building Societies that have got a banking licence, and they are generally excellent.

 

I use CFCU (now Community First Bank) and Defence Bank (formerly Defence Force Credit Union), and I do my daily banking with Bendigo, because I'm a shareholder in the local Bendigo Bank branch. Bendigo are generally slightly better overall than the Big Four banks.

 

One of the things that really sh**** me, is the fact that the Big Four have bought up every second small bank around, and they'd buy the whole lot if they could. So people go to the "smaller" banks (such as the Bank of Melbourne or the Bank of Adelaide), thinking they're going to get away from the Big Four - with many not realising that the Big Four own the small bank they've moved to.

 

SWMBO and I have a holiday savings account with ME Bank, which was established by the Australian Council of Trade Unions in 1994, and which started life as Super Member Home Loans.

It changed its name to Members Equity Bank in 1999, before eventually shortening this to ME Bank in 2009, and it was fully owned by 26 industry super funds from 2002.

However, the industry super funds sold ME Bank to the Bank of Queensland in 2021, saying it had never paid a dividend to shareholders in its entire life. But I'll wager they made good money in selling it to the Bank of Qld.

 

Edited Tuesday at 09:52 AM by onetrack

[red750]

Bendigo and Adelaide Bank (trading as Bendigo Bank), is an Australian financial institution, operating primarily in retail banking.The company was formed by the merger of Bendigo Bank and Adelaide Bank in November 2007. Bendigo Bank used to be Bendigo Building Society.

[onetrack]

My apologies, I confused Adelaide Bank with BankSA, who were bought up by Westpac.

[spacesailor]

" FM " .

All our supermarkets charge a ' credit card ' fee .on ' etpos ' to get a little back from their charges . But not always on " Debit cards ",  then withdraw a little from our bank in cash, no withdrawal fee .

spacesailor

 

 

[red750]