I've just recently moved to London to go to grad school, and the only bank account they will let me have as an international student costs 5 pounds a month just for having the account. Not for using someone else's ATM, not for spending money I don't have, just for having the account at all.

They are charging _me_ fees when I'm lending them my money. It's like negative interest.

And back home in Hong Kong, banks charged you a monthly fee just for not having enough money in your account. Let me be very clear that I am not talking about overdraft fees. No, they charged you fees for having a positive amount of money that just wasn't large enough for their liking. The minimum balance was something like US$6000. In other words, there's a fee for being poor.

There was an even more basic account that you could have with a lower minimum balance, but then you wouldn't get a checkbook.

Thanks for your note, which should provide some perspective.

There are US banks that do similar things. "Commercial banks" (which want wealthy business owners as their main customers) are more likely to do this.

However, most "retail" banks offer free or low-cost no-frills checking accounts to anyone with a regular paycheck that has their pay deposited electronically. This gives the bank insurance against overdrafts (because the first thing they'll do with your next paycheck is pay your fees and debts) and also reduces the staff they need to hire (because nobody needs to stand in line to give the paycheck to the teller).