Banks and Credit Unions

When Hubby graduated with his engineering degree about six months ago and went back to work, he made a decision to have all of his pay deposited in a Credit union account. We’ve always been a little weird about how we handled money, having accounts as Yours, Mine and ours. Now the checking accounts are more his and hers. (Note: all accounts are legally joint accounts – the checkbooks are usually kept in the same place, etc so there is no fear of “hiding money”.)

So the former “ours” checking account is at a local, regional bank. Mine is at a different credit union from his. So I decided I want to close the account at the bank. We have not had any big issues with them, but credit unions are generally friendlier and pay better. So I had a few automatic payments and I went about changing those over to my credit union account. Then I change jobs. I joined the credit union that services my employer, mostly because they are an authorized provider of a 403(b) for my employer. I set up my direct deposit to put an amount in the new credit union and the net in the old credit union. So I’ve got that all set up. Credit unions, woo-hoo! Well, the old credit union is in the city where I live. The new credit union is in the city where I work. When Hubby and I were driving around the area in between the two cities casing out neighborhoods, what dawned on me but “Hum no credit union branched for either of my credit unions in this town. I’m not use there are branches of credit unions that have an agreement with my CU to not charge for ATM transactions.” But I did see lots of branches of our local Bank. They are in the local grocery store and close by the shopping areas. Hum! My money habits hav me pulling out my weekly cash when I go grocery shopping on Saturday Mornings. I don’t often think about hitting the credit union ATM at work. I’m not sure there is a really convenient ATM close to my building.
So Now I am rethinking this whole “stop doing business with the regional bank business.” I hate to pay ATM transaction fees. So maybe I’ll keep the bank account open and deposit the monthly spending and gas money in there. Of course this means dealing with 3 ATM\Debit cards. But I will be able to easily track how much I am spending in gas with this new job