[entwisi]

We've done the whole bash banks thing previously.

I work for one, they are a business, they make money for their shareholders, the vast majority of profit comes from business/investment/credit side of the business. To run a current account costs money. Have you ever stopped to work out how much is invested in ATM networks? the bank I work for has > 2000 machines each costing significantly over £100K, then you have software costs and supply/maintainence on top. how much do you pay to use your own banks machines, nowt, nadda. likewise you walk into a branch(Costs money to buy and run) speak to staff(Wages) who access systems(Mega Millions of pounds worth) who deal automagically with billions of payments each week, making sure your DD's, STO and cheques etc all get paid. They look after your cash (from £1 to £XXXXXXXX's) in a secure manner that you can't lose out as they are managed by FSA regulations. what does this cost you? £NOWT.

When you opened an account you were all given a full T&Cs which outlined all charges etc but as is usual nobody can be bothered to read it so you just sign that you accept it without so much as a cursory glance. Then when you get charged for going outside what you agreed to you complain.

IS £40 outrageous, possibly, what the whole claim your bank charges things is about is NOT the behaviour of charging you, only what that charge should be. The steer is that they should charge you something like what the actual cost to the bank is (commonly quoted at £15) yet this does not take into account anything of teh infrastructure costs I outlined above.