Discover Forgives Fees — Well, Some — For Checking, Savings And Money Market Customers

Discover is in a forgiving mood. The payments company on Tuesday (May 8) launched a fee forgiveness program that applies to Discover’s cashback checking, savings and money market accounts.

Forgiveness goes only so far, of course. The program will automatically waive the “the first eligible fee when it occurs each calendar year, with no action required by the customer,” Discover said in a press release.

Consumers who receive fee forgiveness must be Discover Bank customers. Eligible fees include the insufficient funds fee, stop payment fee, excessive withdrawal fee and money market minimum balance fee, Discover said.

“Discover designs products that are simple and easy for our customers to use, which is why we made this feature seamless,” said Arijit Roy, vice president of Deposits at Discover, in the statement. “While others continue to add fees, we’re committed to helping our customers save more with accounts that have no monthly maintenance fees and the ability to earn cash back on debit purchases.”

Discover is offering its once-a-year forgiveness as banking fees continue to increase, and financial institutions such as Bank of America and Wells Fargo end or limit their free- or low-fee checking account offerings. Those increasing fees include overdraft charges, which according to Bankrate.com increased by an average of 1 percent in 2017. According to a recent report, overdraft fees recently hit their highest level since the end of the Great Recession in 2009 — a trend blamed largely on credit unions.

The fee forgiveness programs follows the announcement of Discover, in February, that it had launched rewards program for its Cashback Checking account. That program enables customers to earn cash back after completing debit card purchases. Cashback checking customers can earn 1 percent cash back from as much as $3,000 in qualifying debit card monthly, Discover said.