NORTH PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The average ATM surcharge is now $1.47, accordign to Bankrate.com's Spring 2002 Checking Account Pricing Study, up two percent from Bankrate's 2001 study.
While the most common surcharge is $1.50, according to the study, more institutions than ever before are charging $2.
Ninety-nine percent of the institutions surveyed offer ATM cards, and 90 percent of them assess surcharges. That's up from 69 percent surcharging three years ago.
Using General Accounting Office data on the number of ATMs and non-bank ATM transactions, Bankrate.com estimates that consumers will pay more than $2.2 billion this year in ATM surcharges, up 18 percent from the 1999 estimate of $1.91 billion.
Bankrate.com also found that the average foreign fee charged by financial institutions when their customers use another bank's ATM is $1.38, up two cents from October. Eighty-eight percent of institutions charge their customers for using non-bank ATMs. The most common charge is $1.50.
According to Bankrate.com, some banks charge customers a monthly or annual fee for having or using an ATM card. Just nine percent of institutions surveyed in the spring study did so, a number that has held fairly steady since October 1999. The most common fee is $12 per year; usually billed as $1 per month.
