So - the banks have agreed to a test case.

Think it was accepting the inevitable rather than an entirely voluntary choice - but what do you reckon will happen from that?

On the one hand - yay for consumer champions and all that - but doesn't this mean the banks will follow up with their threat to end free banking?

So the majority will end up paying up because of the credit defaults of the minority?

It's time consumers stood and and stopped allowing banks to nickle and dime us to death.

15 years ago they wanted people to use ATMs and said it would save time and money. It did....so they started charging fees to "maintain" and accoutn and to use the ATM.....claiming that they had no choice because it was expensive. People accepted it. Since then we have accepted everything they have done.

If they want to charge us for banking...fine. We can go back to stuffing it into a mattress. They need US more than we need THEM!

Actually, with the low interest saved on many current accounts, the mattress seems a pretty viable alternative.

This is why I stopped using banks as my method of saving money. I had figured out that they were earning so much money off of my money just for me holding it in their institutions.

It's also why I use a local bank. A small locally owned bank in a small town treats people very differently than a large corporation bank with just a local branch office.

For example, this was a coal mining town. When the mines closed and people were looking for work, those with mortgages held at the local bank did ok. The bank waited...in some cases for months. They didn't take a single home.

That wasn't true of the other banks.

The difference was they are a part of the community and were more inclined to try to help their friends and neighbours rather than skin them alive.