They’ve been pulling a fast one on us over and over again.

Have you ever noticed how the price you end up paying for many goods and services is always higher than what you expected to pay? There’s hardly ever a bill that doesn’t come with junk fees. Junk fees are defined as fees designed either to confuse or deceive consumers or to take advantage of lock-in or other forms of situational market power.

Junk fees have the greatest impact on America’s most vulnerable populations. According to the White House, “fees account for tens of billions of dollars in revenue – a substantial source of revenue in many industries, including transportation, banking, internet, and hospitality.”  In 2019, bank overdraft and non-sufficient funds (NSF) fees accounted for $15.5 billion in revenue according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Junk fees are exploitative and have a substantial effect on financially insecure groups of people. According to The White House blog:

• A CFPB study found that consumers in low-income and majority-Black neighborhoods paid disproportionately more in credit card late fees.  
• A survey by the Financial Health Network found low- to moderate-income households incurred overdraft fees at nearly twice the rate of high-income households and that Black and Hispanic households were charged overdraft fees at substantially higher rates than white households.  
• A 2017 report by the National Consumer Law Center found that Hispanic car buyers paid more in costly add-ons – such as service contracts, insurance, and window etching – than non-Hispanic car buyers. 

On October 26, 2022, under the Biden-Harris Administration, the CFPB made two things clear:

• Surprise overdraft fees are unlawful. These are fees charged for overdrawing a checking account even though at the time the account owner made a purchase, the bank’s website or ATM terminal showed the customer that they had sufficient available funds for the purchase. 
• Additionally, CFPB has established that surprise depositor fees are unlawful. Surprise depositor fees are fees charged to customers who deposit someone else’s bounced check. 

Making surprise overdraft fees and surprise depositor fees unlawful will save consumers more than $1 billion annually.

MoCaFi is junk fee free. MoCaFi was founded on the radical belief that high-quality, no-cost financial services can help close the racial, ethnic, and social wealth gaps preventing over 90 million Americans from fully pursuing prosperity. MoCaFi doesn’t pass on any surprise fees to their customers.