A significant cost and infrastructure exists at banks to support bank passbooks.  Royal is trying the old fashioned way by charging for it.

“By ROB CARRICK for globeandmail.com Royal Bank of Canada is about to start charging a “maintenance fee” of $2 per month for what used to be one of the most basic services a bank provided for its customers. The fee will apply starting July 1 to RBC clients who use a bank book, also called a passbook, and who don’t ante up for one of the bank’s all-inclusive service packages at $4 to $30 a month.”

Source: “ePaymentsnews Blog – Post details: Fees speed humble bank book’s demise. Good riddance – Mozilla Firefox”

I think this is short sighted.  The sources of cost attributable to passbooks are (amongst others):

1. ATM printers, and stationery
2. DDA system programming costs
3. branch print outs comprising back ups to lost passbooks

Why not eliminate all three, and replace with one information repository holding customer transactions that is sourced in online banking for all customers.  For those who are not online, provide at a single branch PC, accessing the same online banking data source, and charge $ for this print service.

Relevance to Bankwatch:

Customer loyalty is going to be maintained by holding on to the last vestiges of 1950’s banking services.  Its time to make some big strategic moves.

tags: passbooks, online+banking, banking+strategy