Along with the savings account, the checking account is the most basic of financial account available to a consumer. This is the account that places you in control of your own finances. You manage the money coming in and going out of this account on almost a daily basis.
If you are new to personal banking, you might need a primer to help you make the right selection to fit your needs because there are differences between accounts. Here are the basics you need to know about a checking account.
Initial Deposit Amount. How much does the financial institution require as an initial deposit to get your account opened? Some have differing minimums.
Free From Fees. Find out if the account is free from monthly service fees and charges. Most banks have free checking, but you might find an asterisk after the word ‘free.’ This is because they might charge you a monthly fee if your balance goes below a certain dollar amount. Others might take the aggregate amount of all of your accounts and keep your checking truly free as long as you have balances opened in other accounts. If the bank you are interested in has these fees, find out how much they are.
Interest Bearing Account. Does the checking account have an interesting bearing feature? In other words, will they pay you to keep your money in that account? If so, how much.
Online Banking Access. Do they offer access to your account via the Internet? Can you make payments from this Internet access? Most banks provide for this type of activity, because it reduces the amount of in person handling of your money and thereby keeps their expenses lower.
Statements by Email. Do they offer sending of your monthly statements via email as opposed to postal service? Again very important to them as they try to reduce the costs of sending out paper statements. The benefit here is convenience to you.
Customer Service. What is there customer service like? You most likely will not find this out by contacting the bank. You will get better answers to this from customers. Find out who some of their customers are by asking around. Their answers may surprise you. Keep in mind that sometimes when a customer has a bad experience, it stays with them a lot longer than good ones. Get two or three good recommendations to help balance out any overly negative opinions that you hear.
Armed with this information, you should be able to make a wise choice about where to place your money into a checking account.
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