NotBettyGrable

NotBettyGrable t1_j3269th wrote

All the seniors I know bank almost exclusively in person.

Also your "one or two branches" in each province assertion is demonstrably false. If you aren't from rural Canada you might not be aware that you don't have 6 different banks and a credit union in town. Many towns have one bank. Despite totally capturing the banking for that area, the customer loyalty is zero.

2

NotBettyGrable t1_j32665a wrote

Postal banking would be great for the average Canadian but it costs a lot of money to run a political party and the fancy people who own everything and the ones who run for office go to the same gala dinners.

That may sound like conspiracy but it's just the gross way major companies operate in Canada. We pay crazy high phone bills and bank fees and internet. We have a few major companies selling each of those and their markets are protected.

We have a few major grocery stores. They apparently fixed the price of bread for 14-16 years. So far the biggest consequence has been a $25 gift certificate from one of the companies involved. I think you have to give up your right to sue, though.

Anyways, in my opinion we support these totally not capitalist entities with protection legislation and we don't really help smaller companies trying to innovate in actual competitive environments. It is perverse.

3

NotBettyGrable t1_j3244gr wrote

We only have a few banks in Canada and they are billion dollar a quarter behemoths with no real competition, much like our media companies. They have gala dinners with all the important political people so I don't think that is going to change anytime soon. There are credit unions as an alternative but there are trade offs to using them, for the average person it probably has more to do with the marketing reach of the big banks, to be honest.

The crazy thing is, they want to close branches but still want you to come in for high touch service so they can try to sell you stuff. Like I was trying to transfer money in from another bank and they wanted me to come in to discuss. They have two different agendas that conflict at the moment.

3