Ok first thing you should know is that this is very out of character for me as I consider banking a personal thing. Saying that, nearly everyone I know is in the same financial situation as us, there really isn't a lot of room to move these days with interest rates, petrol, food and everything else going through the roof.
The reason that i'm writing this is because I just received a letter from our credit union. In their wisdom and GREED they have changed their entire fee structure. Over the years we have set things up so that we rarely have to pay fees. To achieve this we have arranged direct debits for our mortgage and use bpay for other bills, we do the majority of our banking online, signed up for a visa debit card and really go out of our way to avoid anything that could cost us money.
In the letter they state and I quote in bold capital letters as in the letter
Dear Member
"BECAUSE WE KNOW EVERY CENT COUNTS
At ******** we believe our members should have the opportunity to conduct banking without paying excessive fees. Thats why we only charge what's needed for us to remain financially sound."
Bottom line is that the absolute minimum we can pay to recieve the same service we currently get is 2.50 a week. Now if you have money to spare this may not seem like much but for us it's just another straw. Some of you may already pay more than this....we used to thats why we changed to a credit union all those years ago. Over the years they have sneaked this in and that in but they have always offered a way through savings or changing the way you bank to keep fees down. Now it dosn't matter how good I am with money there is absolutely no way that I can pay my mortgage and get money out even once a month without incurring fees.
This is just so unfair to me, how can they get away with this and what is next? I mean this isn't just "hey we are going to charge you extra starting next month" this is an unbelievable price hike!
To rub salt into the wound they are currently running advertisments that go on about how they are the fasted growing credit union in Australia.....WELL NOT ANYMORE GUYS!!!!!!!!! You are about to be the fastest SHRINKING! Everyone I know who is in this credit union is reeling and NOT ONE OF THEM is planning to stay.
So that brings me to a queston for you all.... who do you bank with?
Thankyou for reading climbing off my soapbox now
