… especially when you’re breaking up with your bank.
Our relationship started innocently enough. I was young. My parents approved of him. He was local. It was a lovely, rosy time.
But then things got a little tougher. First, ATMs started charging me fees, so I had to find his ATMs, which were suprisingly hard to come by. If I got money at any other ATM, I was charged a fee by the ATM, and then he, out of jealousy I suppose, charged me a fee, too. But I let it go for awhile. I mean, it’s just a little fee, right?
As I got older I wanted a savings account, so, ever loyal, I opened one with him. But since I had little money, he paid a piddly fee and I was fortunate to earn more than 10 cents on my savings. That hurt. I thought he cared!
Then I started seeing his commercials. He bragged about offering free things, like checks and ATMs. Never mind that the free checks ran out years ago. Never mind that the only free ATMs were his and I’d have to reroute my commute to use them. He didn’t care. He even bragged about online billpay being free. So I signed up and he charged a fee.
I found myself looking at other banks. I noticed that they paid more for savings. With a cheating heart I moved my savings to another bank and made an unreal $4 the first month on my tiny amount of money. I was happy. But after receiving a billpay charge I realized I wanted more.
I looked and looked. ING, my savings account bank, paid a high rate for checking but offered no paper checks, which is a deal breaker for me. Montgomery Bank had a spiffy deal but I had to make 12 debit transactions a month, which meant going off my carefully structured cash budget. But I found Chuck.
Chuck is paying interest on my money. Chuck is reimbursing my ATM fees. Chuck gives me checks to write. I had to open a brokerage account, but I don’t even have to use it. I combed the fine print. I think Chuck is the one for me.
Of course, now I have to go about the business of dumping my current bank. This nifty guide at the Simple Dollar is proving to be quite helpful. I’m monitoring all my automated transactions and will be getting paperwork required to start the switching process. It will take time, but I’ve shed my tears and I’m moving on to something better.
However, in the immortal words of 2gether, “The hardest part of breaking up is getting back your stuff.”