Viva Veracruz & Viva Puerto Escondido
More Banking News
We interrupt our work in progress entry for this important update regarding expats and visitors to Mexico and the U.S. banking system.
If you have been reading along here then you know Bank of America has recently changed its free ATM withdrawal agreement with Santander Bank and Scotia Bank. Previously Bank of America customers could make ATM withdrawals for free at those Mexican banks.
Additionally they provided a favorable exchange rate of about two tenths of a peso fee for each U.S. or Canadian dollar exchanged. That was increased to one half peso taken from the exchange of each dollar to pesos.
Bank of America ATM withdrawals are now costing from about $2 USD to as much as $20 USD..
Many expat residents in Mexico have maintained Bank of America accounts specifically for the reason of free ATM withdrawals and favorable exchange rates. Many.
There is now a petition circulating which it is important for everyone to sign.
Please sign the petition. Sign it even if you are not currently in Mexico or currently exchanging dollars for pesos.
In regard to all this Karina a member of Puerto Escondido Tom Zap Forum writes (we reproduce here with permission) BOLD emphasis is mine:
| Karina [ PM ] [hide msgs from this user]Re: Bank of America Petition December 05, 2013 12:51AM | Registered: 6 years ago Posts: 124 |
I spent a rather unremarkable hour yesterday with the assistant manager, Scott Poindexter, at my local B of A branch in the U.S.When I initially asked Scott to verify the new rules regarding ATM withdrawals outside of the U.S., he had not heard anything about it.Fortunately for me, Scott and his new wife are interested in buying a place in the Playa del Carmen area and so will be spending some time in Mexico. Therefore, he had some particular motivation to find out the answer to my query.After a number of phone calls on his part, he verified that B of A is no longer allowing withdrawals from Santander ATMs without a $5 transaction fee and a 3% foreign currency conversion fee. He wasn’t very happy about it either. According to the information he was given, B of A has not left the Global Alliance Network and still allows fee-free ATM transactions in other parts of the world. It was just severed its relationship with Santander/Scotia.When I told him that there was a petition being circulated online against this move by B of A, he encouraged me to sign it and said that B of A actually pays attention to this sort of action by its account holders. So, for what it’s worth, it can’t hurt to sign the petition. For those who think it isn’t their problem because they don’t bank with B of A, your bank/credit union may be next.
And from another source:
“It’s fair to say that Bank of America (NYSE: BAC ) is the pariah of the banking world. It found itself at the bottom of the heap in a J.D. Power survey of mortgage customers; it was the worst-performing bank on last year’s American Customer Satisfaction Index; and the industry publication American Banker recently announced that it has the lousiest reputation among both customers and noncustomers of any large lender in the country.” (Source HERE)
‘If I want to ruin my day, all I have to do is call up Bank of America,’ one commenter noted. ‘Bank of America engages in the biggest legal thievery in the USA,’ noted another. And ‘[Bank of America] takes perverse pleasure in hurting its customers,’ said a third.”
As suggested within the many comments made on our Forum taking all your money out of Bank of America has a profound effect on them. We suggest you consider changing banks if you have that option before you. Our current pick is Charles Schwab – you can read about that Here and Here.
Next time back to what we are up to. Stay Tuned!
