Web petition snowballed to drive bank’s retreat

WASHINGTON – Recent college graduate Molly Katchpole has $2,200 to her name, holds down two part-time jobs – one of them as a nanny – and describes her financial situation as paycheck-to-paycheck.

So when Bank of America announced that it would begin charging debit card users a $5 monthly fee, Katchpole got mad and started an online petition. More than 300,000 people signed it.

And on Tuesday, the nation’s second-largest bank backed down.

Now the 22-year-old is getting the credit for the end of the debit card fee.

Katchpole is a Rhode Island native who lives in Washington, where she does freelance work for a political communications firm that supports unions and other Democratic-leaning causes. She describes herself as a progressive and says she stands in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement. She has a tattoo below her collarbone that reads: “Empathy.”

“I believe that is the most important quality that a person can have, is the ability to empathize with others,” she said. “When I first started the petition, and even now, people were saying, ‘Just close your bank account and go to another bank.’ I think people are forgetting that not everybody can easily close their bank and join a credit union. There are some neighborhoods in this country where there’s only one bank.”

Shortly after Bank of America announced plans a month ago to start charging the fee, she put the petition on Change.org, a nonpartisan website that allows individuals and advocacy groups to launch campaigns on any topic.

“It’s an awesome display of the potential power that real people can have when they come together,” said Ben Rattray, the site’s founder and CEO.

Katchpole credited the popularity of her petition to good timing, calling it “stupid” for Bank of America to announce the fees in the midst of the Wall Street protests. Her boyfriend, Ben Sisko, said Katchpole succeeded because she expressed her outrage so clearly.

The petition read, in part: “The American people bailed out Bank of America during a financial crisis the banks helped create. … How can you justify squeezing another $60 a year from your debit card customers? This is despicable.”

A Bank of America executive called Katchpole more than three weeks ago to explain the fees, but by then it had already lost her as a customer to a community bank.

Michael McCauley, a spokesman for Consumers Union, the advocacy arm of Consumer Reports Magazine, said the petition was a sign that Bank of America had misjudged its customers. He called Katchpole an inspiration to consumers who feel they are being treated poorly.

“The debit card issue pushed her over the edge, and she took action, and look at the impact that she’s had. I think it’s remarkable,” he said.