When you want to make a photocopy of bank documents some bank might charge you RM1-RM2 per copy whereas you only need to pay RM0.05 – RM0.10 per copy at photocopying center. If you need to certify your bank documents for partial EPF withdrawal to settle your housing loan partially, some bank charge you RM30 – RM50 even if you produce your own documents for Bank officer to certify them.

Recent finding make me wonder what else they won’t charge their customers? For their ATM card they would either give you 3 free ATM transactions and thereafter they would charge you a fee per transaction; or they would charge you RM8 per year for unlimited transaction. Telco sim card is of similar quality and they only charge their customers RM5 during registration and thereafter no charges on sim card. This prompt me to wonder why Bank ATM card entitled bank to charge annual fee of RM8? May be the initial investment cost of hardware and software related to ATM machines is so high that they have to resort to this annual fee? Or just may be the cost of leased line from Telekom Malaysia took a bit bite on their annual income?

RM8 per year might looks small to some but when we assume each bank has about 500,000 saving accounts using ATM cards it will give RM2.5 million annual income to the Bank without any risk (unlike the risk in the case of loan and overdraft facilities). Perhaps Telekom Malaysia Bhd should lower their leased line cost so that banks could pass the saving to their customers and reduce or do away with the annual charge of RM8?