Customers of these four banks will no longer pay bank fees due to these new ATMs coming to their cities.
220 euros… this is the average amount French people lose each year due to bank charges. As a reminder, bank charges vary from bank to bank. Organizations charge them for various reasons: maintaining an account, getting a bank card, insurance, etc.
In addition to these regular costs, customers may also face event-related bank charges. This can be, for example, agios or intervention commission, which follows an overdraft on the account. Finally, banks charge fees when customers withdraw money from ATMs that are not part of their banking network. For example, Société Générale customers pay a fee if they use a Crédit Agricole ATM.
The problem is, 2024 will be a particularly expensive year for bank customers. According to consumer association CLCV (Housing Consumption and Living Environment), “banking fees will increase by an average of 3% this year”.
However, the good news is that BNP Paribas, Société Générale, Crédit Mutual and CIC are working together to offer customers the possibility to withdraw from these four banks at no extra cost. To do this, institutions have created a new type of ATM and are installing these machines in more and more French cities.
Called “cash services”, these distributors also offer other services such as depositing checks, cashing, printing bank details, making transfers and accessing accounts. A boon for millions of French people who, until now, often had to choose their distributor carefully to avoid unfair withdrawal fees.
This pooling of ATMs among these large banks responds to the financial challenge for banking institutions. This is to reduce operating costs. Indeed, according to the French Banking Federation “the number of ATM withdrawals has decreased by 12% between 2018 and 2022”. Clearly, maintaining a dense network of distributors is becoming less and less profitable for banks.
Pooling of ATMs, besides reducing the financial burden for banks, offers a practical solution for customers, allowing them to save significantly on bank fees associated with withdrawing money. In conclusion, the arrival of these new “cash services” distributors across France is a significant development in the French banking landscape. It represents a step forward towards greater convenience for customers and reduction in operational costs for banks.
