Vanguard is quadrupling maintenance fees

   I just got a letter from Vanguard recently telling me how happy they are
to be getting rid of numerous fees that evidently didn't catch enough
people.  Now, instead they are instituting requirements for larger amounts
in each account that will catch us, and cause us to pay an extra $80 a year
in fees - about 4 times what we were paying.  I think I could have stood
this without complaint, except that the whole tone of the letter was about
how HAPPY they were to be simplifying their fee structure.  In other words,
they were HAPPY to announce that they would be charging me more, and
expected me to be happy about it, too.

  Of course, they did offer to get rid of the fees - if I agreed to only get
notices through email.  I'm certainly not going to do that - paper records
are just too valuable when it comes to this sort of thing.  Besides, they
only mailed me about a dozen letters a year anyway.  What does that cost -
about $6?  Certainly not 80 bucks, so I don't buy their argument that doing
it by email is going to save them a lot, unless they plan on also sending me
a bunch of junk mail, which would cost them more to send through the postal
service.

 

I would opt for the e-mail vs. snail mail.  As well as saving the $80 a
year, you get the notices faster.  If you are worried about things like a
hard drive crash, you can always open a G-mail account and archive the
messages there and forward a copy to your usual email.  You can also print a
hard copy for your file.

--

Roger Shoaf

About the time I had mastered getting the toothpaste back in the tube, then
they come up with this striped stuff.

    As it happens I know someone who has had a Vanguard account for
years. Upon getting the notice she called up a rep and explained that if
the fees were no waived she would close her account. In addition she
insisted verbal confirmation within 24 hours and written confirmation
within three business days. She got both.

 

A fee waiver or an account closure?

 Roger Shoaf wrote:

   By "both" I meant verbal and written confirmation that the fees were
being waived.