Banks Profiling Your Spending

The new regulations on banking have taken a big chunk of change out of the banks pockets. I believe better consumer protections needed to be in place, but it hasn't made my life much easier. As one of those people who doesn't overdraft, pay interest on credit card debt, or otherwise get hit by fees, I was able to profit off those who do. I've enjoyed free checking and will only have to deposit $400 into my Roth this month thanks to the $100 cash back bonus I'm getting from my 2% rewards card.

Now, it's becoming harder and harder to find free checking - especially when there's no way you're going to be able to talk someone into switching to direct deposit who hands you a handwritten paycheck every week and thinks that automated payments are for losers. Yes, seriously.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to get free checking without two direct deposits every month?!

Anyway, I stumbled across this article on CNN today about bank profiling of spending. Companies like Alite Group and Cardlytics analyze the spending on your credit or debit card and provide you with discount offers based on what you might be interested in. Much like the way companies like Ebates work, the banks take a commission when you make a purchase through these offers. The projections for the potential of these profits reach towards two billion over the next few years!

I'm more than happy to be profiled if it means that I might get an offer for something I would be buying at full price anyway. I'm sure that for some people this would mean temptation (which is really the whole point of coupons, I guess) but I usually exercise pretty good self control. However, when a deal comes up on Groupon or LivingSocial that I know I will use and would have bought anyway, buying it really saves me money. And if the banks can get back a chunk of the change they've lost, that could save me even more money if the banks loosened up a bit.

An interesting concept, and one I'm excited to see go into motion. What do you think?