Where is the money actually leaking?
Business bank fees have a way of becoming invisible.
An account gets opened. Treasury services get added. Pricing gets negotiated. The company grows. People change. Five years later, the bank is still billing for a relationship that may bear very little resemblance to the business using it.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the bank is overcharging you.
Sometimes the pricing is stale. Sometimes you’re paying for something you don’t use. Sometimes you’re using the wrong account structure. And sometimes a recurring fee is actually telling you that something elsewhere in the operation needs attention.
The objective isn’t simply to eliminate fees.
It’s to understand what you’re paying for and whether the banking setup still makes sense.
1. Account analysis charges
Many commercial banking relationships use account analysis rather than a simple monthly maintenance fee.
The bank prices the services the business uses, then may provide an earnings credit based on eligible balances to offset some of those charges.
That makes the relationship harder to evaluate than looking at the bottom line of a checking statement.
Start with the earnings credit rate. If the rate you’re receiving has remained relatively static while the interest-rate environment has changed materially, ask why.
Then look at the balances being maintained to generate the credit.
A large operating balance isn’t free just because the bank isn’t charging you an explicit fee for keeping it there. That money has an opportunity cost.
The right question is not just, “How much did the bank charge us?”
It’s also, “What are we giving the bank in exchange for the pricing we’re receiving?”
2. Per-item and transaction fees
Commercial accounts can charge separately for deposited items, checks paid, ACH activity, and other transactions.
Individually, the charges can look insignificant.
At volume, they aren’t.
More importantly, transaction charges can reveal that the account structure no longer fits the activity running through it.
A company that has grown substantially since its accounts were established may still be using products and pricing designed for a much smaller operation. The opposite can happen too: a business may be paying for a commercial package with capabilities it barely uses.
Look at both the unit price and the volume.
If one line item has become expensive, understand whether the problem is the price or the way the account is being used.
3. Wire and payment fees
Incoming and outgoing wire fees are easy to spot, but the better question is why the business is using wires in the first place.
Some payments genuinely belong on the wire system. Others may be better suited to ACH or another payment method.
Look at the volume, purpose and urgency of the transactions.
Then look at the workflow around them.
If the business sends repetitive wires to the same parties, ask whether templates, approval controls, or another payment process would make the activity both more efficient and more secure.
A lower wire fee is useful.
Eliminating unnecessary wires can be better.
4. Remote deposit and lockbox charges
Remote deposit capture and lockbox services are often established when a business has a clear need and then left in place indefinitely.
Check whether the need still exists.
How many checks are actually being deposited remotely? How much activity is going through the lockbox? Does the volume you’re paying for resemble the volume you’re actually sending?
The answer may be yes.
But businesses change. Customers change how they pay. Electronic payments replace checks. Locations open and close.
A service that made perfect sense three years ago can become an automatic monthly charge nobody has reconsidered.
5. Positive pay and fraud-control fees
Fraud-control services are different from most of the items on this list because the objective should not be to eliminate a useful control just to save money.
Instead, verify that you’re getting the protection you’re paying for.
If the bank charges for positive pay, confirm that the appropriate accounts are enrolled, files are being transmitted correctly, and exceptions are actually being reviewed.
The same principle applies to ACH debit blocks, filters and other treasury controls.
Paying for a fraud-control service that isn’t properly configured can create the worst of both worlds: the cost of the control without the protection you thought you had.
This is one area where the cheapest answer is not necessarily the right answer.
6. Overdraft and NCP charges
Recurring overdraft or non-collected funds charges on a business account deserve attention, but not only because the fees are expensive.
They can be evidence that the account structure doesn’t match the way cash moves through the business.
Money may be sitting in one account while another account overdraws. Deposits may not be concentrating efficiently. Automatic transfers may be poorly timed. The operating account may simply be carrying the wrong target balance.
In those situations, negotiating a lower overdraft fee doesn’t solve the underlying problem.
Fixing the cash structure does.
If these charges occur regularly, trace what was happening across the company’s accounts when they occurred. The fee may be the symptom rather than the problem.
The total fee is only the beginning of the review
Add everything together and you can determine what the bank charged the business.
That’s useful, but it isn’t the end of the analysis.
For every meaningful charge, ask four questions:
- What are we paying for?
- Are we actually using it?
- Does the price still make sense?
- Is there a better way to structure the activity?
Sometimes the answer is to negotiate with the bank.
Sometimes it’s to eliminate an unused service.
Sometimes it’s to change an account or payment process.
And sometimes the review shows that the current banking relationship is working exactly as it should.
The point is to know.
Your bank fees should tell you something
A bank fee review shouldn’t end with a list of charges highlighted in yellow.
The useful part is understanding what those charges say about the banking relationship and the way the business manages its money.
A Business Banking Review looks beyond individual fees at the accounts, treasury services, payment activity, controls, and overall banking setup behind them.
The objective isn’t to promise that I can make every fee disappear. It’s to determine whether you’re paying for the right things, using them properly and getting a banking relationship that fits the business you have today.