Banks try to capitalize on attracting new (and young) customers on campus these days. Most Universities have entire bank branches on campus. The bank branches are pretty aggressive in marketing to these new potential clients. They will entice them with trinkets and other “perks” to open new accounts. The account they especially want to be opened is a Credit Card.
When I was at University, the on-campus bank knew that many students were in Co-op, and thus excellent new victims for their bank service fees. I opened a bank account on campus at first, primarily for ease. I lived on campus at the time, but then they started enticing me with new exciting services like:
- My first credit card, because now I made money (4 months at a time). I could now start learning about the joys of CREDIT (and hopefully not pay my bills on time).
- RRSP loans, to move income around from year to year. If one year I worked for 8 months, you could normalize the income with the following year, by using this loan, for a small fee.
- ATM machine access and their fees (yes I am that old that this was a new service back then).
The CIBC branch at the University of Waterloo had a pretty sweet business. Some people still bank with CIBC because they started at the U of W. I changed banks after I moved off campus. Canada Trust (now TD) was a closer bank, but I kept my CIBC credit card for a long time.
Banks are always looking to get NEW clients who want to pay Bank Fees and put their savings in their banks for the bank to use. When you send your child/student off to school keep this in mind and maybe talk to your kids about banking and the ins and out's of the "Banking Game".
