ATM fees are on the rise at some of the country's biggest banks.

Chase, for example, is testing out $5 fees for non-customers. That means if you stumble upon a Chase on your way to dinner and decide to take out 20 bucks, you'll pay a 25% fee. And that doesn't even include what your own bank charges you for going out of network, which is typically around $3.

82Email Print JP Morgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) is currently testing the $5 ATM fee in Illinois and a $4 ATM fee in Texas -- both for non-customers who use its ATMs -- to see if they bring in enough revenue to introduce nationwide, according to sources familiar with the tests. A Chase spokesman declined to comment.

Out of the bank's network of 16,000 ATMs, more than 20% -- or about 3,600 -- are located in these two states. Chase spent an estimated $400 million to build the entire network and pays $200 million a year to run it. So the bank is making non-customers pay a significant amount for the convenience of using this large network.

Meanwhile, HSBC Bank USA (HBC) this month started charging all non-customers a $3 fee for using its ATMs, saying that this pricing is more competitive. Previously, about 60% of its ATMs charged a $3 fee for non-customers, while the remaining 40% charged either $1.75 or $2.50.

While other megabanks like Wells Fargo (WFC, Fortune 500), Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500) and Citi (C, Fortune 500) haven't made similar changes yet, CardHub.com CEO Odysseas Papadimitriou says they're not far away.

Hate ATM fees? Try these fee-friendly banks
"It's easy to compare debit cards by looking at the monthly fee, so banks are going to try to minimize the monthly fees and load you with fees in different ways -- and ATM fees are going to become one of the most popular ways to do that," said Papadimitriou.

Even some of the banks that CNNMoney once called the least evil -- because they had free checking and zero ATM fees for customers -- are having to reconsider.

http://money.cnn.com/2011/03/16/pf/a...ex.htm?iid=RNM gee how much do we really need banks - time to think credit unions more and more.