Eastern Bank

Been with this bank for almost 40 years and have never had any problems. Had our checking, savings and mortgage accounts with them.

This bank will offer you a free checking account with no fees, free atm, etc. This all sounds nice and hopeful, but once you are with them, then you see the fees. You can only use their atm machines, if you use another atm say with Citizens Bank or any others that have the NYCE network, you will be charged a fee of $3.50 which I'm told is the fee that Citizens charges, THEN at the end of the month Eastern will charge you $2 for every atm out of their network called a foreign atm fee. NONE of this was disclosed when opening the account even after all my questions, I was told I could go to the other ATM machines that are with NYCE, not so. None of this was disclosed to me when I opened this account. Not only are you charged these fees, if you happen to bounce a check they won't wait for your direct deposit to go on, they automatically take your ATM/Debit card from you. If you do this more than once, you are never given an ATM/Debit card ever again, you are forced to move from this bank. I'm told that this is not across the board, it is up to the individual branch and the branch on Lynn Street, Peabody is the branch that does this on a regular basis. Each Branch of this bank has their own rules. God forbid if you break any of their rules, you are penalized, your online account is shut down, you have no means to balance your checkbook if you can't get online. I was warned to not bank with this bank, but I didn't listen. Anyone thinking about going to this bank I would think again. I would never recommend this bank and I think they are breaking the rules of the Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices Act. BEWARE!