I'm fed up with Bank of America charging me $108 a year for a checking account, so I'm now in the process of switching to Amalgamated Bank. Not only are checking accounts free at Amalgamated; the ATMs and McDonalds and several pharmacy chains are also free.

Thanks Chuckburst!

I have had a business account with Chase for 40 years, back to when my branch was Manufacturers Hanover...at Christmastime I changed $100 dollar bill to smaller bills for tips...later when I looked at my statement there was a $1 charge for "currency order"..unbelievable!

@Freelancer - I'd recommend cutting out any and all unnecessary expenses (booze & coffee, eating out, cable, gym membership) so you can build up some savings to see you through. Sell things you don't need. Get a roommate. Ride a bike. Shopping smart and learning to cook is the single most important thing you can do here. Good luck!

Has usury been legalized?

i recently received a call from my regular bank, NYCB aka Roslyn Savings Bank, informing me i now needed to maintain $1000 balance in my "over 50" checking account or be charged a monthly fee. or i could change my account to one where there was no balance or fees but i wouldn't earn interest - which is a joke in itself considering the percentage of the interest.

my business account in another bank, citizen's bank, which has never charged any fees will now be charging me $10 a month because i only write one check a month to pay my credit cardf bill.

somehow shopping around is not the answer because it seems each and every bank will find ways to get additional fees from their depositers.

hey BL Show producers aka Big Brother-
i hear they're looking for opinion suppressers in egypt, tunisia and yemen. maybe you could go work for one of those totalitarian regimes instead of removing opinions from a public radio opinion webpage?

I strongly dislike the fact that we had to bail out these big banks and then they have the audacity to charge these crazy fees! They should be happy we are putting money in the accounts at all!

Have a zero balance on CITICARD.

Then why am i being charged 6.88 on monthly interest fees -- with the proviso that if I am late on payment I will pay an $80 fee??

One can unsubscribe to sale sites, such as Lands End. At the bottom of the promotional email there is usually an "unsubscribe" option. Out of sight--out of mind.

I discovered that it's better to put your money into an ING interest bearing account than to leave it in Citi Bank and pay the annual fees...

I remember a report that came out decades ago saying that the bigger banks were the ones that treated their customers worse. Is that still the case? Can using a smaller bank help save money?

I have a credit union, and they have more free ATMs than bank of America.

Tech CU in Santa Clara, CA has free ATMs in New York.

"There is not and will not be QUICKEN for the IPAD or IPHONE."

-Quicken customer service last month

As the guest just commented, here is the link to the web site of the NYC Office of Financial Empowerment as part of the Dept of Consumer Affairs

http://www.nyc.gov/html/ofe/html/home/home.shtml
Maybe Brian can invite a guest from this NYC agency to comment on the services.

Starbucks is not the cause of your money problems, people. It's that you don't understand math and the power of compounding interest rates. That house you think you own is really owned by the bank, and you'll pay three times the prices of the original purchase price by the time you're done with the mortgage payments. Then in the end, the government will tax away whatever money you happened to save in your zero percent savings account.

There are banks that refund ATM fees. First Republic Bank is one. I get a credit at the end of the month for all of the fees charged by other banks. And they do not charge me for using other bank's ATMs.

Everyone who has transferred their credit card debt to a new card with a one-year 0% APR: GO CHECK THE EXPIRATION DATE NOW on the promotional APR. I didn't make a note in my calendar, and I ended up paying $50/month in interest the last three months, without noticing it was largely interest I was paying.

It sounds dumb, but I am really responsible, and this still happened to me. After a busy year it's easy to forget!

I want to keep to a budget and take better control of my finances, but I am a freelancer and I always have huge cash-flow problems. I go thru huge ups-and-downs in terms of month-to-month income as I wait for clients too pay me, or hunt for more work. Any advice for handling unsteady income responsibly?