Bank of America Corp (NYSE: BAC) will begin offering free checking accounts to customers which only make use of it web services and ATM machines and don’t make use of branch services.
The Charlotte-based bank will be introducing an account on August 6th which won’t charge a monthly fee or minimum balance, unless the customer wants to visit a teller or receive a monthly statement through the mail, said David Owen, a senior vice president for checking and debit at Bank of America Corp (NYSE: BAC). Visiting a branch to make a deposit will trigger an $8.95 fee per month, he said in an interview with Business Week.
Bank of America Corp (NYSE: BAC) has tested the program in the state of Georgia for the last eight months, with more than one-third of customers selecting the account. Owen said that, “It has had a much broader appeal than we initially thought,” he said.
Owen said that the firm sees the account as something different from the mid-1990s programs by First Chicago Corp and other banks which leveraged a $3.00 fee to people who visited tellers instead of ATM machines. “This account is up to the customer and they can choose how they want to bank with us,” Owen said. “This is nothing like those early programs.” Owen said that customers that need to deposit coins or have service-related questions will not be charged a monthly fee.
Bank of America currently has about 18,000 ATMs nationwide.
