Get A New Bank Account!
You Can Find a non-ChexSystems Bank
Something has gone terribly wrong with the American banking system. This country's financial institutions at one time took pride in serving their neighborhoods--common, decent, ordinary working people--but no longer. The fact is, banks have been progressing more and more towards serving the elite, and forgetting the rest of us. Their increasingly aggressive account policies make it clear that banks simply don't want to be bothered with small account-holders who merely deposit their paychecks every week and pay their bills. We don't make them enough money.
ChexSystems, a database maintained by Deluxe Corporation, helps banks achieve that goal. This company, which is not accountable to consumers, holds all negative information about your banking habits. If you ever bounced a check because you were a few hours late to get to the bank to make a deposit, you're on the ChexSystems report. If an automatic debit hits an account you just closed, you're on the list. ChexSystems makes no differentiation between someone who is overdrawn a couple dollars for an honest mistake, and someone who tried to commit a fraud.
And once you're on the list, you're on it for five years. No exceptions. And most banks, if you are on that list, will not open a bank account for you. There are still a handful of non-ChexSystems banks, but they are hard to find. That's why there has been such a proliferation of check-cashing stores, which rip you off by charging three to five percent of your paycheck to cash it for you. America's unbanked population is getting larger by the day.
The idea, on the surface, is that ChexSystems protects banks against people who commit fraud against them. Well and good, but that's really not what happens. The vast majority of people on ChexSystems are not criminals, just people who may have made an accounting error, been late to the bank, or just couldn't avoid becoming overdrawn for one reason or another. Many people on the list have already made good whatever debt put them there; it makes no difference. You're still on the list, and unless you were fortunate enough to find a non-ChexSystems bank, you're out of luck.
At last count, at least 80 percent of all banks are ChexSystems banks and that figure is growing daily as more financial institutions sign up. It's getting harder to tell which banks do not use ChexSystems, and the many free non-ChexSystems bank lists that you find online quickly become out of date. Banks that do not use ChexSystems today may well become a ChexSystems bank tomorrow.
You're reading this because you're looking for a non ChexSystems checking account, but have found it difficult to locate a non ChexSystems bank in your area. You're tired of paying the check cashing store's fees, and want to get out of ChexSystems. In your efforts towards ChexSystems removal, you may have even contacted your old bank, or ChexSystems itself, and chances are, you got nowhere.
There's a lot of information about how to find banks not using ChexSystems. The Internet is full of systems, lists, schemes and scams that offer a checking account for people on ChexSystems. Some of them cost a lot of money, some are free. Some of them are very useful. But here, we'll provide some useful information for free. After searching through and researching information about having a bank account with no ChexSystems, we've come up with some good information, some tips and tricks, and a solution for those who want to have a bank account with no ChexSystems.
