ASSEMBLY, No. 124

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

Introduced Pending Technical Review by Legislative Counsel

PRE-FILED FOR INTRODUCTION IN THE 1996 SESSION

By Assemblyman JONES

An Act concerning deposit account service charges and supplementing Title 17 of the Revised Statutes.

    Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:

    1. As used in this act:

    "Commissioner" means the Commissioner of Banking.

    "Customer" means a holder of a deposit account in the depository institution.

    "Depository institution" means a State or federally chartered bank, savings bank, savings and loan association or credit union.

    "Service charge" means any fee or charge related to a deposit account in a depository institution, including, but not limited to: periodic maintenance fees; processing of checks drawn against insufficient funds; record searches; checks drawn; deposits and withdrawals; inactive accounts; wire transfers; stop payment orders; certifying checks; and sale of checks.

    2. a. Every depository institution with an office in this State shall provide a list of its service charges to a newspaper or newspapers, as the case may be, whose circulation provides coverage to the community or communities in which the depository institution maintains an office for transactions with customers.

    b. This list shall be provided each year in the months of January and July.

    c. The list of service charges shall include only those items which are consistent with customary and prudent banking practices as set forth in policy statements or regulations of the depository institution's appropriate federal financial supervisory agency.

    3. This act shall take effect 120 days after enactment.

STATEMENT

    This bill would require all depository institutions with an office in this State to provide information regarding services charges related to deposit accounts to a newspaper or newspapers whose circulation covers the community or communities in which the depository institution has an office or offices. The bill requires each depository institution to submit such information on a semiannual basis, once in the month of January and again in the month of July. The information required to be submitted to the newspapers would be no more than is already consistent with customary and prudent banking practices as recommended in policy statements or regulations of the depository institution's appropriate federal financial supervisory agency. As costs associated with having a deposit account in a depository institution continue to increase year after year, the provision of this information in this manner will provide consumers the ability to shop around for a depository institution that provides a deposit account at the least cost for that consumer's purposes.

Requires depository institutions to provide information on deposit account service charges to newspapers.