South Africa’s entry-level bank accounts compared

Several bank accounts in South Africa come with a very low monthly fee and affordable pay-as-you-use costs for those with minimal banking needs.

MyBroadband recently compared South African bank accounts with no monthly fee but found that many of these options had exorbitant per-transaction costs.

Absa, Capitec, FNB, Standard Bank, Bidvest Bank, and Old Mutual offer bank accounts with monthly fees of less than R10 with some bundled value included.

We decided to compare the costs of using one of these accounts by combining their monthly fees and several transaction charges.

The basket of transactions used for this comparison was as follows:

• 1 x cash deposit of R1,000 or less at own bank ATM or point-of-sale
• 2 x cash withdrawals of R500 or less at own bank
• 1 x cash withdrawals of R500 or less at another bank
• 3 x external debit orders
• 3 x payments to other banks
• 2 x prepaid airtime purchases
• 2 x prepaid electricity purchases
• 20 SMS notifications

With the combination of transactions listed above, we found the cheapest option was the Capitec GlobalOne account — at R61.50.

While the bank charges the highest monthly fixed fee of the accounts we compared, its per-transaction costs were very low.

For example, withdrawals at other banks’ ATMs were only R10 per R1,000 block, compared to the minimum fees of R14.30 per R100 at FNB or Standard Bank.

Capitec’s external debit order, payments to other banks, and prepaid airtime and electricity charges were also among the lowest.

Capitec was followed by the Old Mutual Money account, which worked out to R69.45 with the same mix of transactions.

The third-cheapest option was FNB Easy PAYU, which worked out to R74.35.

The chart below compares the banking costs of the six cheap pay-as-you-use bank accounts we found in South Africa.

At the most expensive end was the Absa Transact account, working out to R103.70 for the transaction basket.

While it carried the lowest monthly fixed fee, Absa’s payments to other banks, prepaid airtime purchases, and cash deposits were the most expensive of all the banks.

It was followed closely by the Bidvest Bank Grow account at R101 per month.

The bank charges of various common transactions for the accounts compared are summarised in the tables below.

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