Advice to College Students on Bank Promotions: Read the Fine Print<br />Despite the spread of person-to-person payment options like Venmo, he said, “cash is still preferred in many situations.”<br />Big banks like Chase and Wells Fargo typically market “student” accounts that waive monthly maintenance fees while you’re in college.<br />“Just because it looks like official mail from your school,” he said, “you don’t have to accept it.”<br />Colleges are now required to disclose their bank marketing agreements on their websites, along with details about the related costs paid by students who use the accounts,<br />and to make the information available to the federal Department of Education.<br />Some colleges, it said, may not have reported yet or the information may not have been posted to the website yet by the Federal Student Aid office.)<br />So students shouldn’t automatically choose their school’s “official” bank account — or assume<br />that the account is the best choice for them — simply because it comes with a card bearing the school’s logo, said Seth Frotman, the student loan ombudsman for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.<br />And in that case, the best option may be to keep using that account, said Chris Moon, consumer banking analyst with financial website ValuePenguin.<br />Don’t rule out local credit unions, which may offer low-cost accounts, or online<br />banks, which can be a cheap option if you don’t mind a lack of branches.<br />But bear in mind that once you graduate — or five years after the account was first opened — the bank will typically<br />start charging you the fee, unless you meet other requirements to have it waived, like a direct deposit.
