Not content with whacking a charge on ATM machines everytime you withdraw cash, Caixabank has now announced a second €2 which will be applied at their end. And other Spanish banks admit they are mulling the charge over.
So if you use a Caixabank card to withdraw cash from any hole in the wall, you get charged €2. And if the hole in the wall machine doesn’t belong to Caixabank, you get another charge from the owner of the machine. It could cost you €6 to withdraw €20.
Here’s an example of what it will cost you to get €20 out of your account in future with Caixabank:
Until now, depending which bank or caja you were with, you could usually (not always!) withdraw cash for free from the network of hole in the wall machines your bank belonged to (Servired, Euro6000 or 4b are the main networks). If you used a different network you would be charged a commission. But over the last few years banks have been quietly changing their commercial agreements and reducing the number of free transactions.
The trouble, according the banking industry, is that hole in the wall machines are expensive and the banks aren’t making enough cash off the money being held in your account. Caixabank along has almost 10,000 hole in the walls across Spain.
Meanwhile, consumer groups are warning that this is likely to become a common charge amongst banks and have requested that the Bank of Spain investigate the Caixabank charges.