Photo courtesy of Endless Studio
This is a guest post from Karen Galarpe, who also writes for our entrepreneurship blog Open for Business:
I went out one morning to pay my Social Security System contribution. Since I am self-employed, I pay my contributions myself to the banks. BDO, the bank I have an account with, does not accept SSS and Philhealth payments, so I have to go to other banks.
I usually go to RCBC Savings Bank on Visayas Ave. (near front of Montessori) because there’s hardly any line there. I think the last time I paid there was July. As of then, it was still free to pay your SSS contributions over the counter. For the next months, I went to East West Bank and UCPB (depends on where I am that day). On this particular day, I went again to that RCBC Savings branch. And the male teller said they’re now charging P10 just so I can pay my SSS contribution over the counter!
Ten pesos is cheap, true, but I don’t like paying for something I can get for free somewhere else. So I made a U-turn to UCPB at the corner of Visayas Ave. and Congressional, and I didn’t have to pay a single centavo.
Why should a bank charge for a service that’s offered free elsewhere? Why should we pay for something we can get for free elsewhere with the same, if not better, quality of customer service?
This is the same reason why I only withdraw from my bank’s ATMs.
From MoneySmarts: the thing with bank fees is that unlike Karen, most of us would rather just pay and swallow the fees hook, link and sinker. It pays to keep an eye open on the fees that you are asked to pay and compare these with other banks.
I know comparing is not a walk in the park, either, because not a lot of banks disclose fees on their websites and the only way to know that someone is offering a service for free is to physically ask at the counter. And that takes a lot of time. But time is money and money is time. Convenience has always been expensive.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:20 am
@Jen-
It is in the Phil. labor code that companies should pay employee compensation in cash, or through other means that will be very convenient to the staff.
In your case, your company should have setup a payroll account with a bank that has an ATM at or very close to your work location.
Cirrus is an infrastructure network which certain banks use to connect their ATM’s. This is similar to Bancnet and Megalink. But if a bank is not affiliated to that network, they cannot use it for free. They have to pay for interchange fees.
Now, Cirrus is an international network and Metrobank is not affiliated with them. So Metrobank had to pay interchange fees (in US$) to Cirrus whenever they use their network, which the bank in turn pass to the customer (still in US$). And the bank still has the bragging rights of having so much available ATM’s nationwide. Same goes with Bancnet and Megalink but they are local infrastructure and charge only small fees, which you might not notice (in the P1 to P11 range).
As per Salve’s blog, “convenience has always been expensive.”
October 16th, 2008 at 10:51 am
I have known some people who were shocked by the charges of those Cirrus marked atm cards. It may be the same for those MC marked atm cards as well but I don’t have information on that. From what I know, this is how it goes:
We have 3 atm networks here right? That’s expressnet, bancnet and megalink. If you withdraw from a bancnet atm and your card is only good for expressnet, the system will instead use the CIRRUS gateway (given that your atm card is marked CIRRUS as well as the atm you’re withdrawing from) and thus you get charged that almost Php300 fee. Balance inquiries also get charged in these situations (around Php 150 i think).
That is why it is highly recommended that you only withdraw from your own bank’s atm.
Can we guys all contribute to list all the useless fees we get charged in different banks here? That would help us to save a great deal in our banking transactions.
October 16th, 2008 at 10:11 am
I hope that banks should be honest enough to say to the public what are those charges are. Kaya nawawala tiwala ng tao sa mga financial institutions kasi due to greediness.Tama si Obama, ang dahilan ng Wall Street fall is due to greed. Look at our local bank executives, ang gaganda ng buhay. Where do they get those perks di ba sa mga depositors? Sana napanood ng mga taga bangko ang interview ni Donald Trump sa CNN, para they will think about before giving bonuses to their ownselves.Hay buhay, kawawa naman tayong small depositors…sana we get a good share of their profits too!
October 16th, 2008 at 9:38 am
In my case, I looked at my transactions online just recently. Then I saw a P200 service charge deducted from my payroll account. Unfortunately, it was not specifically mentioned where those charges came from. (Heck, I only transact with the branch where I opened my account and I still have charges!).
So I looked at my diary of expenses (lucky I have one) and realized that i made an over the counter withdrawal in my bank’s branch, once when their ATM is offline.
So I checked the BPI’s website, and what do I found out? They charge 200 for over the counter transactions (for ATM account).
I still have to check if they also charge for EPS transactions that are processed through other terminals, like BDO (when I shop at SM). I think they also do…
October 16th, 2008 at 9:34 am
hay naku, its true!
i have a metrobank atm (wala ako choice kasi payroll account), once upon a time,
i withdrew from bdo atm, to my surprise when i checked my account online,
there was a debit of almost 300 pesos.
that cirrus sh*t s*cks!
baket ka i-charge ng international fees, e nandito ka naman sa pinas nag-withdraw.
up to now, di ko pa rin ma-gets ang logic.
pede pa-explain baka me nagbabasa dito na taga-bangko, enlighten my ignorance.
most of us, may not notice this, pero imagine at least 100pesos ibawas sayo, pagpalagay na natin, may katulad kong gumawa nun, 10 pips in a day times 30 days, times 12 at least me 360k in a year si bangko (very conservative estimate ito ha), i wonder kung san sya napupunta? sana si metrobank magdagdag ng atm para di naman kami kawawa na babawasan ng lintik na charges ung savings namin!