'User Fee’s, as profit stream, are now all the rage, and will continue to be so until someone decides to actually protect consumers from such exploitative practices.
I wouldn’t hold me breath, if I were you.
Think about PayDay Loans for a minute. There are usury laws in the country that are supposed to protect people from loan sharking. And yet, somehow these places are effectively charging people unbelievable interest rates (100’s of per cents!) all by cleverly disguising the ‘usury’ as account fees and service charges.
They sprung up like mushrooms, are now seemingly everywhere, and target the most vulnerable in our society, effectively served up on a silver platter to predatory capitalists by an uncaring government. But we didn’t care, because it wasn’t us being exploited.
But now, it’s our turn. Every bank, every utility, every industry now recognizes that new rules apply. It’s open season on consumers, as long as you name it ‘fee’ or ‘charge’, it seems.
If there were true consumer protection, no business would be allowed to use such ‘fees’ as a revenue stream. There ought to be legislation created to deter this very profitable and exploitative practice. Such as, if you’re charging an account or service fee, it cannot exceed your actual costs.
As in, if it costs the bank .05 cents, per transaction, for the ATM, then they are not allowed to charge $.95, etc. Profits so generated could be taxed at 120 %, say, to discourage this.
I wouldn’t hold my breath though. The robber barons are in charge and hold all the power, have no doubt. It’s just that it’s now the middle class’s turn to be served up for fleecing, that’s all.
You know it’s a new world when a presidential candidate won’t even tell you, when asked, exactly how many homes he owns! When people believe such nonsense as, ‘Just help us be more efficiently exploitative, get even richer, and some of our wealth will surely trickle on down to you!’ As long as people are stupid enough to believe this tripe, I don’t foresee any change.