_6 Ways To Cut The Cost Of Your Car Loan

Posted: June 6, 2011 1:25PM by Tim Parker

With financial headwinds like rising gas prices, a slowly-recovering economy and continued job scarcity, reducing costs in every corner of our financial lives has become a necessity. Unfortunately, our cars aren't concerned with our economic troubles; when they break down for the last time and we are forced to buy a new one, finding the best deal on financing becomes a necessity. (Driving is often the most convenient way to get around, but it'll cost you. See The True Cost Of Owning A Car.)

TUTORIAL: Introduction To Insurance

1. Tighten Up Your Credit
The terms of your loan are based on your credit score. If you have perfect credit, you receive the lowest possible interest rate. If you don't, you have to pay more because of your questionable repayment history. If you have problems with your credit and you don't need to purchase a car right now, consider waiting until your score increases. Just a small increase in your interest rate can save you a lot of money over the life of your loan. (Learn more in Can You Hit A Perfect Credit Score?)

2. Don't Borrow Too Little
If you only need a few thousand dollars, don't apply for an auto loan. Instead, save your money (if your car purchase can be put off). Small loans are paid off much more quickly than larger loans. Since the interest on the loan is how banks make money, they don't want your loan paid off quickly. Because of this, smaller loans often have much higher interest rates than loans of higher amounts. This allows the bank to make a more acceptable amount of money off of you. Of course, some car purchases are emergencies, and the only option may be the fast one. Set your loan limit at $5,000; anything below that amount should come from your savings account.

3. Refinance
Anybody who owns a home knows that mortgage rates have dropped significantly and because of that, refinancing their home makes a lot of sense. What many consumers don't know is that they can also refinance their car. Not only does it lower the monthly payment, it reduces the amount of interest you're paying which allows you to pay off our car sooner. Cars depreciate rapidly, making it imperative that you pay off your loan quickly.

How much money does it save? Let's assume you received a 60 month loan for $16,500 at a 21% interest rate because you had less than optimum credit. This loan would cost you $446 each month and you would pay approximately $10,300 in interest over the life of the loan. If you were to refinance and get a 7% interest rate, that payment would drop to $330 per month and you would only pay just over $3,300 in interest. What could you do with an extra $116 per month? Hint: add it to your existing car payment to get it paid off faster. (If car costs are dragging you down, find out how to free yourself of some of the extra weight. Check out 12 Car Insurance Cost-Cutters.)

4. Don't Stop at the Dealership
Just as your car dealer is a middle man when selling you a car, they are also a middle man when they want to set you up with a loan or a lease. Middle men always get paid for their trouble, and the person paying is probably you. Of course, you should get a financing quote from the dealer but if you stop there, you may very well end up paying too much for your loan. You probably did some shopping around for your car. Do the same for your loan.

SLIDESHOW: Top 5 Money-Saving Tips For Your Car

5. Lease it
Leasing a car is generally considered to be a bad idea, largely because you're paying a monthly payment and in the end, you will not own the car. Is leasing really as bad as people say? If you're somebody who wants a new car every few years and don't want to pay the repair costs that come with owning a car for an extended period of time, leasing may be right for you. Not only is the payment lower but in most states you only pay sales tax on your monthly payment instead of the total value of the car. Since a lease is designed to charge you for your use of the car instead of the purchase of it, you also don't incur the full cost of depreciation on the vehicle.

Leasing is not right for anybody who wants to own the car once all payments are made, but if you would rather not own a car, leasing may be a good choice for you.

6. Buy a Cheaper Car
It seems like an obvious and not so profound piece of advice, doesn't it? Sadly, it isn't as obvious as most would think. The facts are clear in that America has an awful habit of purchasing what they can't afford. They have an overreliance on credit and that could be financial disaster if a life-changing event happened. What's worse, our country's belief when it comes to financial matters is that it's ok to be drowning in debt for most if not all of our adult lives.

Do you have to purchase a new car or could a pre-owned model from a few years ago meet your practical needs for a car? Do you really need a luxury car and have you really "earned the right" to purchase an expensive car that will put you deeper in debt? It may seem like obvious advice, but it's worth considering seriously. (Accident, theft, vandalism - make sure your coverage will protect you when you need it most. See Top Tips For Cheaper, Better Car Insurance.)

The Bottom Line
There are numerous ways to save money on your car payments. The final word of advice is to not rush the process of buying a car. From the very beginning, weigh all of your options carefully and you'll make the choice that's right for you.

SOURCE

_25 Debt Reduction Tips For Your Immediate Action Plan

With credit cards so convenient, loans so common and debt socially acceptable, getting into debt is extremely easy. I still have vivid memories of the two people who sold me on my college credit card. It had the school logo on there and best of all, it helped the school every time I use the card to pay for a purchase. How cool is that?

SOURCE

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Dislike: How Facebook Can Hurt Your Credit

Posted 6 days ago by Libby Kane

Forget “you are what you eat.” When it comes to your trustworthiness as as borrower, you are who you know … online.

Social networks are now being used by some lenders to evaluate whether you’re likely to pay them back.

The New York Observer reports that, while this methodology is still a few years away from common use by major banks, smaller institutions such as microlender Lenddo already use an algorithm based on input from a person’s various social networks to determine her creditworthiness. And more are likely to adopt the practice in the future.

Here’s the kicker: The information used by the algorithm isn’t just what you’ve made public—the banks are requiring your login information. Everything you can see, they can see. And they could even potentially send messages to your contacts.

From the perspective of the banks, “birds of a feather flock together.” They want to reach more customers likely to use their products through you. For a consumer who wants a loan, banks having more information isn’t necessarily better—especially when it’s open to interpretation.

What an Algorithm Can See

When you register with a bank that uses a system like this, you would be required to verify your login info for your social networks, like Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. Information from the accounts would then be fed into the algorithm, and, using what it could glean from your social media profile and networks, the bank would pass judgment on your borrowing merit. The algorithms, still in development, are closely guarded secrets at present, but they’re essentially a way of crunching even more complex factors to assess how big of a credit risk you might be. As Lenddo’s CEO recently put it, “There’s no reason there shouldn’t be thousands of engineers working to assess creditworthiness.”

So, What’s the Problem?

The fear isn’t so much that the information gleaned from your networks will affect your actual score, but that gaining access to extraneous information that’s currently illegal for a lender to request (like race, marital status and receipt of public assistance) will contribute to systematic discrimination known as “redlining,” where certain segments of the population could be refused loans or charged higher rates based on racial, sexual or other prejudice.

Even seemingly innocuous social info can be damaging to customers. In one case, a Canadian woman’s disability payments for depression were revoked after her employer’s insurance company saw pictures of a beach vacation she’d posted on Facebook. While insurance fraud is common, in this instance, the 29-year-old woman’s doctor had advised her to exercise and socialize with friends. Then, without any notice, the checks stopped coming.

Why Your Networks Matter to Financial Institutions
1. To Leverage Your Connections

This means that banks will both judge you on your friends and use you to make new ones of their own. Their logic? If your friends are upstanding citizens who pay off their loans, you will be, too. And, reciprocally, if you’re responsible, they’re ripe for targeted marketing. Banks can’t message your friends directly, but they can gather names and contact information from the profiles of people in your social circle.

2. To Make Sure You Pay

As anyone who has read “Confessions of a Shopaholic” knows, avoidance is a key tactic when dodging bill collectors. But when the people you owe are authorized to contact your Facebook connections about unsettled accounts, it’s a different story. Although this wouldn’t be any institution’s first course of action, it’s within Lenddo’s rights to post on your own public Facebook wall that you’re behind on payments. And you have to agree to that when you sign up—it’s part of the terms and conditions.

What Can We Do?

Keep an eye on the developments. At the moment, the algorithms are still about three to five years away from public adoption, so there’s no need to panic. But keep in mind that no matter how adept your manipulation of Facebook privacy settings, they’re ineffective to someone who can login as you. If the social network algorithm enters mainstream use, the only real way to eliminate judgment is to refuse to sign those papers to grant lenders access to your networks.

As Dan Tynan of PC World puts it: “Will you be legally required to give your bank access to your Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn profiles when you need credit? Probably not. But they won’t be legally required to approve your loan, either.”

http://www.learnvest.com/2012/01/dislike-facebook-can-hurt-your-credit-score/

Thanks to Karen for this post

Simple Checklist that could have prevented Ben Bernanke's Wife from being ripped off by Aggressive Identity Thieves

Tips are below:
 
Fr: Lee Bellinger, Publisher 

Re: A Simple Checklist That Could Have Prevented Ben Bernanke's Wife from Being Ripped Off by Aggressive Identity Thieves 
This is an urgent message for you – or anyone who has a friend, parent, or spouse who underestimates the severe and growing risk of identity theft. This common crime is turning lots of unsuspecting people into paupers overnight and even getting some wrongly arrested. 
No one is immune from identity theft. Especially the unprepared. Here's a high-profile example where no fancy high-tech maneuver was involved, nor any violence, nor much sophistication. 
Anna Bernanke, wife of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, recently went to the Starbucks near their Washington, D.C. home. As she was sipping her beverage, her purse was snatched off the back of her chair. 
According to Newsweek, court records reveal Mrs. Bernanke's purse had her "driver's license, Social Security card, four credit cards, and a book of Wachovia bank checks from the couple's joint checking account. Printed on each check were the Bernanke's bank-account number, home address, and telephone number."
If it can happen to individuals of the Bernankes' rank and status, you better believe it can happen to you. For today's Executive Bulletin, we've assembled a 26-step checklist you can follow to protect your identity, and the identities of those you care about, from this fast-growing crime. 
What's more, by implementing these identity-shielding steps, you also reinforce your privacy from government goons and frivolous-lawsuit scumbags.
No one is safe from identity theft. PrivacyRights.org reports that from 2005 to today, over private 542,335,668 records have been breached! In only one month, over 5 million records were put at risk of exposure and abuse. 
26 Common-Sense Steps to Prevent Identity Theft 
and Protect Your Privacy
Not all of these steps may be appropriate for your personal situation, so feel free to cherry-pick from the list and implement the ones you need. Make sure to share this list with others you care about, so they're better protected, too. It's a long list, so it might help if you print a copy, tack it to your wall, and check off the steps as you complete them.
1) Alter your phone book listing. Phone books still exist (even though they're not as prevalent as before). Call your local phone company and limit the information they publish about you in the phone book or ask to be completely removed from it.

Digging Out Of Personal Debt

Consumer debt is on the rise in more than just a few countries around the world. According to numbers released in March 2006 by the U.S. Federal Reserve Board, household debt has topped the $2-trillion mark in the U.S. - and that doesn't include mortgage debt. Consumer debt is a common topic of discussion and analysis, but it should not be considered a way of life. How can consumers get their debts under control? For an ever-growing number of them, the answer is debt consolidation. In this article, we show how consolidation can help - and why it often fails.
 
Tutorial: Budgeting Basics
 
The Ideal Process
Debt consolidation basically involves taking all of your debts and moving them to a single source. This often includes personal loans, home-equity loans, car payments, credit card balances and mortgage debt. Most brick-and-mortar lending institutions offer a variety of debt consolidation options. Online vendors also provide a vast selection of programs and a convenient medium for comparing them against each other. When it is done properly, debt consolidation results in a lower interest payment, a lower monthly debt payment and an increased amount of discretionary income each month. 
 
Ideally, the lower payment and reduced interest provided by debt consolidation free up enough income to enable you to live within your means. Once you can afford to make the monthly payment on your loan, you can begin to get out from under your debts by making extra payments in order to retire your loan as quickly as possible.
 
 
Watch: Consolidation DebtThe Reality of Debt Consolidation
While there are a number of financially savvy individuals who use debt consolidation as a tool to manage their finances, this is not typically the case. For most consumers, the need to engage in debt consolidation is a sign that they have been doing a poor job of managing their money. If they weren't, it isn't likely that they would be so deeply in debt in the first place.
 
Further cementing this argument is the fact that, immediately after consolidating, many of these individuals are no longer feeling pressured by their inability to pay their debts, so they go on a spending spree. Their previously maxed-out credit cards now have zero balances and, often, these consumers can't resist the urge to shop. 
 
In short order, many people who consolidate their debt go on to rack up so much additional debt on their credit cards that all of their newfound money is once again needed to make credit card payments. In other words, instead of using debt consolidation to reduce indebtedness, consumers are simply using it to dig themselves a deeper hole. (To read more, check out Home-Equity Loans: The Costs and The Home-Equity Loan: What It Is And How It Works.)
 
Change Your Behavior
Debt consolidation is the first step toward getting your bills under control, but changing your behavior is an equally critical part of the equation. In order for debt consolidation to have a meaningful and lasting impact on your financial situation, you need to break the debt cycle. Simply put, that means that you need to stop spending money that you haven't earned yet.
 
One of the easiest ways to minimize your spending is the elimination of your credit cards. Credit card abuse is one of the leading causes of consumer indebtedness. Another easy step is to put a moratorium on new loans. Your debt consolidation loan was taken in order to get your debts under control. Taking out additional loans is counterproductive. Keep in mind that "loans" include any scenario where you are racking up bills that require repayment at some point in the future. This includes the purchase of new automobiles and the purchase of items that offer no payment and no interest for a predetermined amount of time. (For more tips, see Take Control Of Your Credit Cards, Understanding Credit Card Interest and Credit, Debit And Charge: Sizing Up The Cards In Your Wallet.)
 
Conclusion
Ongoing debt minimization is critical to the long-term success of debt consolidation. Financial experts often note that your outstanding debts, including credit cards and mortgage payments, should not amount to more than 36% of your gross monthly income. That 36% figure is often referred to as a debt-to-income ratio. The ratio is calculated by dividing the amount of money you spend each month to service your debts by the amount of your income. When they do the math, people are often surprised to discover that their debt-to-income ratios are significantly higher than the recommended amount. Determining your debt-to-income ratio provides an excellent reminder that you aren't supposed to live paycheck to paycheck, spending every single dollar that you bring in each month.
 
If you find yourself in financial trouble, use debt consolidation as a tool to get your finances back on track, and then use good spending habits to keep your bankbook in the black. 
 
For additional information about sound ways to manage your money, see The Beauty of Budgeting, Seven Common Financial Mistakes and The Indiana Jones Guide To Getting Ahead. 

SOURCE  

Thanks Going Global....BofA employees flood bank's rivals with resumes ...


Related (Bank of America) Articles:

Is Bank of America preparing for a Chapter 11?... 

Bank of America Will Generously Offer Ways To Avoid Having Them Totally Rip You Off ~ "Isn't That Special" ... and .. Bank of America drops $5 debit card fee plan ~ JPMorgan Chase & Co and Wells Fargo & Co last week decided to cancel test programs ... 

November 02, 2011

BofA employees flood bank's rivals with resumes 

CHARLOTTE, North Carolina (Reuters) - Bank of America Corp employees are flooding rival companies with resumes as a major cost-cutting program gets under way at the second-largest U.S. bank.

Competitors say they are getting an influx of calls, emails and LinkedIn connection requests as the bank embarks on a plan to slash 30,000 jobs over the next few years. The employees are scouting jobs in retail, commercial and investment banking, bankers and recruiters said.

"It's definitely picking up," said a senior executive at a rival consumer bank.

The uncertainty at Bank of America gives competitors a chance to nab talented employees, bankers said. But they cautioned that many companies are only hiring selectively.

Continues ...

In the most high-profile departure, PNC Financial Services Group Inc last week hired Bank of America strategy executive Mike Lyons to lead its corporate and institutional banking unit. Lyons had advised CEO Brian Moynihan on his plan to sell off nonessential assets.

John Dunn, director of the banking and financial services practice at recruiting firm Stephen James Associates, said he has had about 20 calls or meetings with Bank of America employees in recent weeks, mostly in investment banking and capital markets operations. Normally, he might have talked to or met only two to four over that period.

"Now these folks are looking to get out of choppy water before they get displaced or asked to relocate," Dunn said. "It's much easier finding a job while you have a job."

Moynihan is chopping expenses as new regulations, a sluggish economy and low long-term interest rates are crimping profits across the banking industry. Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America in particular needs to build capital to cover mortgage-related losses and meet new international standards.

The bank's efficiency program, called Project New BAC, aims to streamline a company bloated by years of acquisitions. But executives risk cutting too deeply or creating an unsettling environment for those who remain, said Beth Livingston, assistant professor of human resources studies at Cornell University.

"You get the survivor effect," Livingston said. "Everyone is on edge. There's a culture of fear that permeates the climate."

SHAKE-UP

In recent months, Bank of America has laid off employees, including senior leaders, in consumer, human resources, capital markets and other areas, people familiar with the situation said. The cuts are part of a round of 3,500 layoffs announced in August and the first wave of Project New BAC, which takes its name from the company's stock symbol.

New BAC cuts began in September when Moynihan ousted consumer banking head Joe Price and wealth management head Sallie Krawcheck and handed their duties to co-chief operating officers David Darnell and Tom Montag.

In reorganizing his management team, Darnell is merging mortgage operations into the consumer bank, leaving the future position of mortgage head Barbara Desoer unclear. The shake-up also displaced Bank of America veteran Henry Fulton, who has held top credit card, mortgage and consumer banking positions.

Last month, the company said the "implementation" of the first wave of New BAC, which focuses on consumer operations, was to start in October. The second phase, which will address capital markets, commercial banking and wealth management units, begins in the spring.

Bank of America said it had 288,739 employees on September 30, up from 288,084 three months earlier, but about 2,000 have been told they will be let go.

Bank of America spokesman Scott Silvestri declined to comment on the layoffs.

The company ranks behind JPMorgan Chase & Co in terms of assets.

link

Bank of America drops $5 debit card fee plan

Rick Rothacker
Reuters US Online Report Top News

Nov 01, 2011 12:11 EDT

(Reuters) - Bank of America Corp is dropping plans to charge a $5 monthly fee for debit card use, the bank said in a statement on Tuesday.


The second-biggest U.S. bank said the move was in response to customer feedback and competition. Bank of America was under pressure to make the change as rivals backtracked from plans to charge customers for using their debit cards.

"We have listened to our customers very closely over the last few weeks and recognize their concern with our proposed debit usage fee," David Darnell, the bank's co-chief operating officer, said in a statement.

JPMorgan Chase & Co and Wells Fargo & Co last week decided to cancel test programs, while SunTrust Banks Inc and Regions Financial Corp said on Monday they would end monthly charges and reimburse customers.

Bank of America had planned to start charging customers next year. Banks began crafting the monthly charges to make up revenue lost to a law that slashes the fees they charge retailers when consumers swipe their cards. The fees sparked a firestorm of criticism from consumers and politicians, and many smaller banks and credit unions shunned the practice.

Bank of America began softening its stance on the fee last week. The Charlotte, North Carolina, bank planned to give customers more ways to avoid the charge, such as maintaining minimum balances, having a paycheck direct-deposited or using their Bank of America credit card.

The reversal is another embarrassing about-face for Bank of American CEO Brian Moynihan. This spring, he signaled plans for a modest dividend increase this year, only to have the Federal Reserve Board deny the request.

(Reporting by Rick Rothacker in Charlotte, North Carolina; editing by Lisa Von Ahn; editing by Andre Grenon)

Source: Reuters US Online Report Top News

LINK

Finding Info on Bank Fees May Take Digging
Published: Friday, 21 Oct 2011 | 11:09 AM ET Text Size 
By: Molly Tilghman and Sandra Block

The hullabaloo about Bank of America's decision to charge customers a monthly debit card fee has prompted many consumers to take a hard look at the cost of their bank accounts.

Here's the problem: Almost all bank websites will prominently disclose the fees they don't charge. Identifying the fees they do charge is much more difficult.

USA Today analyzed the cost of opening a basic checking account at the 10 largest banks and credit unions. In most cases, information about monthly maintenance fees, requirements to waive these fees, and the minimum needed to open an account are readily available on the institutions' websites. Other fees, such as the cost of taking a withdrawal from an out-of-network ATM or closing an account weren't prominently disclosed.

Searching for a List of Fees

To learn about these fees, consumers must dig up a "Schedule of Fees and Charges." This is where banks and credit unions compile a more detailed list of service fees that apply to their customers. Some financial institutions, such as the SunTrust Bank and Alliant Credit Union, featured a link to the fees on the main checking account page. This, however, was an anomaly. In some cases, we had to Google "Schedule of Fees," and the name of the bank or credit union. Even then, the schedule of fees isn't always comprehensive.


RELATED LINKS
How to Avoid Getting 'Crammed'Best Places to Work on Wall StreetBest Places to Work on Wall StreetObama Names Critic of Large Banks to FDIC BoardPIMCO Bond Man Bullish on US Banks 
Credit unions fared better than banks: With the exception of Security Service Federal, we found a schedule of fees on all their websites (although it sometimes took several clicks). We were also able to find a schedule of fees on websites for Bank of America [BAC  7.35     0.13  (+1.8%)   ], Chase [JPM  36.69     -0.33  (-0.89%)   ], SunTrust [STI  20.63     -0.38  (-1.81%)   ] and Wells Fargo [WFC  27.08     0.01  (+0.04%)   ].

With help from Google [GOOG  600.14     1.47  (+0.25%)   ], we were able to find the fee schedule for PNC Bank [PNC  55.07     -0.90  (-1.61%)   ] and U.S. Bank [USB  26.03     -0.19  (-0.72%)   ].

But even the world's largest search engine couldn't unearth a fee schedule for HSBC, TD Bank, Citibank [C  34.16     -0.01  (-0.03%)   ] and Capital One [COF  46.90     -0.17  (-0.36%)   ]. To get their fee information, we had to email or call the banks.



Determined customers can search for information about fees in banks' official disclosure documents, but they'll need a lot of time and a couple of cups of coffee, too. An analysis of checking accounts for the 10 largest banks by the Pew Health Group found that the median length of their disclosure statements was 111 pages. None of the banks provided key information about fees on a single page, the study found.

"As a result," the study said, "consumers must navigate a confusing maze of disclosure documents in their efforts to locate all of the important account information."

This story first appeared in USA Today.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/44988911

Banks Starting to Kill or Scale Back Debit-Card Fees

Published: Friday, 28 Oct 2011 | 8:16 PM ET Text Size 
By: Reuters

After heavy criticism, big banks are starting to rethink their monthly debit-card fees.

Bank of America [BAC  7.35     0.13  (+1.8%)   ] is revamping its plans as rivals Wells Fargo [WFC  27.08     0.01  (+0.04%)   ] and JPMorgan Chase [JPM  36.69     -0.33  (-0.89%)   ] have decided not to charge monthly fees, ending test programs in certain states.

Bank of America is likely to allow many customers to sidestep the fee by taking measures such as maintaining minimum balances, having paychecks direct deposited, or using Bank of America credit cards, the person said.

Under earlier plans, customers might have needed balances totaling $20,000 across all their Bank of America accounts to avoid the fee.

Bank of Americas unleashed a firestorm of criticism from customers, consumer advocates and politicians last month when it disclosed plans to charge customers $5 per month for using their debit cards, starting sometime next year.

The goal was to make up revenue lost to a law that slashes the fees banks charge retailers when consumers swipe their cards.

While some banks have disclosed plans to apply similar fees, many banks and credit unions decided not to institute the charge and have encouraged customers to switch banks.

Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America is not abandoning the fee now and will likely include it in new account types the bank is testing in three states. The bank plans to roll out these packages nationwide next year.

The $5-per-month fee may still remain an option for customers, the person said.

The bank has said the purpose of the new account types is to provide customers with upfront pricing, instead of hitting them with penalties after the fact. Customers can pay monthly fees of between $9 and $20, or avoid the charges by keeping minimum balances, using their credit cards or having a minimum amount deposited to their account.

Among other banks, Wells Fargo said late Friday that in response to customer feedback it has canceled a five-state pilot program that would have charged customers $3 per month to use their cards

After testing a $3 per month fee in two states since February, JPMorgan Chase has decided not to charge customers, a person familiar with the situation said on Friday. The test will end next month and will not be extended or expanded, the person added.

Citigroup [C  34.16     -0.01  (-0.03%)   ] announced an account overhaul in mid-September that did not include a monthly debit card usage fee. Stephen Troutner, head of banking products for Citi's U.S. consumer bank, said at the time that the New York-based bank found customers were strongly opposed to such monthly maintenance fees.

Richard Davis, CEO of US Bancorp [USB  26.03     -0.19  (-0.72%)   ], said during an Oct. 19 conference call with analysts the Minneapolis-based regional bank is monitoring the results of other banks imposing debit card fees. Davis did not rule out instituting a fee in the future, but said the bank has no immediate plans to do so.

"We will find out if customers complain and move, or just complain," he said. "We will take all that in time and we will make our decision."

SunTrust Banks [STI  20.63     -0.38  (-1.81%)   ] is charging a $5 per-month fee on everyday checking account customers who make purchases. A spokesman declined to comment on the bank's strategy.

Norma Garcia, manager of Consumers Union's financial-services program, applauded JPMorgan's decision, but said that, without more details, it was unclear if Bank of America's changes would be better for customers.

"Clearly, there is overwhelming public support to drop the fee," she added.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/45080627

Bank, Thrift and Credit Union Ratings..Is Your Money Safe?

Bank, Thrift and Credit Union Ratings

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This central site allows you to request a free credit file disclosure, commonly called a credit report, once every 12 months from each of the nationwide consumer credit reporting companies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

AnnualCreditReport.com is the official site to help consumers to obtain their free credit report.

We guard your privacy.
 
Please be aware of how you arrived at this site. To ensure that you are visiting the legitimate site, type the site name https://www.annualcreditreport.com directly into the address bar on your browser. You will never receive an email directly from the Annual Credit Report Request Service
 

Take advantage of your free credit report once a year
 
When is the last time you checked your credit report? Some people never do. Those are the ones who could become susceptible to deceptive loan tactics. 
 
For example, let's say you're at a car dealership. The salesman might put on a big show, saying how difficult it was, but that they finally found a lender who will finance your loan at 14% -- when all along you had great credit, and could have found yourself a loan elsewhere at 4%. 
 
You have a right under federal law to see each of your three credit files once a year, for free:   The special federally-sanctioned site for this is called AnnualCreditReport.com

http://www.annualcreditreport.com. It is the ONLY truly free website to check your credit report.  

Note:  There are many so called "free" credit report sites...make sure you use the only one that is truly free.

LINK