<p>My D will be starting Pomona next month. I would like to open a bank account for her now that she can access both at home and in Claremont. It looks like there are a number of banks in Claremont - can anyone give me an idea of which might be most convenient?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>My daughter has been using Wells Fargo. There is a branch in our home town, so we opened the account before she left home.</p>
<p>There is a Wells Fargo about a 3 minute walk from south campus, which I use. I also believe the campus center has a Bank of America ATM?</p>
<p>Our son uses Chase on Indian Hill.</p>
<p>lolcats is right, The only ATM on campus belongs to Bank of America, and its extremely convenient. I would suggest getting a bank of america account if there is one in your town.</p>
<p>Thanks all. The Bank of America ATM in the campus center just sealed the deal. Also, there is a BOA in our town in NJ :)</p>
<p>Ask for a student account…no or low minimum balance without fees.</p>
<p>There is also a Bank of America branch on Yale street, not too far from Pomona. Our son uses that and it is fine. One word of warning on the student account though. They sometimes put long holds on checks deposited by the student, particularly at the beginning of the semesters. Once it was 10 days before they said it cleared. So, now, if the money is a) from the Bank of Mom and Dad and 2) needs to be available, I just deposit cash in our local BofA branch rather than sending a check.</p>
<p>If your child has an account at BofA, it is much faster (to clear) to deposit a check (written payable to Bank of America for the benefit of your student) at your local BofA than sending a check to your student (payable to your student) and have him/her deposit it. The holds for out of state checks and ones in large amounts (more than $5000) are longer, in my personal experience. Or deposit cash as azalia said.</p>
<p>The easiest way is for parents and students to have accounts in the same bank and have inter-accounts transfer privilege that you can do online. That’s what we did for our student at BofA. We closed our accounts when she graduated.</p>
<p>Thanks for the informative thread.</p>
<p>We just opened our daughter’s BofA account with a ceremonial $47.</p>
<p>^^ so clever!</p>
<p>Just went to open a BOA account today, only to find out that BOA in NJ and BOA in CA are not quite the same. We can deposit and take out money from both, but if we open the account in NJ and D loses the debit card in CA, she can only replace the card in NJ in person. Not worth this hassle and we don’t have enough time to open the account once we get to CA. So… we very easily opened a Citibank account instead.</p>
<p>That seems odd. I’m also originally from NJ with a BOA account and I’m pretty sure that as long as one of you are cosigned on her account that you can pick up the new card and send it out to her. I could be wrong though!</p>
<p>I am co-signing with her but they were insistent the her card could only be picked up by her.</p>
<p>It really seems odd. My D had lost a few of her debit cards and I am sure the bank sent it to her through overnight mail. I’ve never had a debit card not delivered to me by mail.</p>
<p>My DH went to deposit check for DD at the BoA here in NYC and was told her account would have a $8.95 fee deducted from her account–because HE deposited it with a teller here! Is that even legal? Yuck!</p>
<p>The student account with BOA in California has no charges if ALL the banking is done online or at an ATM and paperless. As soon as they set foot inside a branch to do any transaction there is a $8.95 fee. If your DD has a California account it will also take much longer for the money to appear in her account since you did it through BOA of NY.</p>
<p>Thanks, NJ Mom. We opened the account on move-in Sunday on campus, and while the bank officers were very nice, I’m quite sure they didn’t mention a depositor other than DD effecting a charge for an out-of-state deposit. I can understand BoA wanting to get the college business and not have to deal with swarms of students in person, but I can’t see that parents/grandparents/whoever should be penalized in NY or elsewhere. Had the $8.95 been mentioned that day, it would have made me sit up.</p>
<p>Dinmor - I guess your options are to either send her a check and let her deposit it, or inquire about getting a second ATM card and depositing a check in the BOA NY ATM. Of course the alternate is my choice - my D has a job on campus and funds her own BOA account!</p>
<p>Dinmore - I tried depositing a check in my D’s BofA acct once and was denied. So, now I just take cash in to the teller and deposit that way. They don’t give me a problem or charge me. I don’t know if that would make a difference for you. We opened her acct here in Illinois before she went out to California so that may make a difference in our situation.</p>