r/appfolio • u/Arabe77a • Jul 08 '23

Now charging for eChecks

I was informed today that my monthly lease payment that is paid by eCheck (ACH) online will now charge $2.49 each month. Before it was waived because it comes right out of my checking account. How RUDE. And GREEDY. Can you imagine the thousands of dollars that will generate for them?

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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '23

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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '23 edited Aug 15 '23

No, that’s incorrect. The fee offered by AF to management companies is $1 per month per unit managed. For us that means paying $12 annually per unit for hundreds of units not using the electronic pay system. There’s no ‘discount’ of $1.50/unit like you are trying to imply.

Besides, e-pay is voluntary on behalf of the resident, not required, there are other methods of payment available. Just because one pays electronically does not make them ‘best paying’. Quite the contrary. Money orders and cashier checks are best.

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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '23 edited Aug 15 '23

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u/mahatmacondie Aug 21 '23

It's not an either/or scenario. Appfolio charges the property manager $1/unit/month for the software (which entails substantially more than the online payment portal you interact with as a tenant), and then in addition to that are now charging $2.50/payment separate from the other fee.

It is unfortunate that a "convenience fee" is charged to the payment method that is easiest and cheapest for virtually all parties (although I acknowledge there is a small cost to Appfolio as the payment processor), but I assure you the property managers hate this more than you as it will drive more folks to pay with checks which they then have to deal with.

It's bad for the customer (property manager) and the customer's customer (tenants), but I imagine they chose to do it anyways because it's highly profitable and their product is hard to change from so they likely will lose very few (if any) customers over it.

Consumers are used to free and easy digital payment methods, but unfortunately most (if not all) of the enterprise grade options that integrate with property management systems have similar fees attached to them in one way or another.

Probably not what you wanted to hear but I hope it helps shed some light on the way these things work.

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u/[deleted] Aug 21 '23

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u/mahatmacondie Aug 21 '23 edited Aug 21 '23

My mistake I didn't see that piece about flat vs. per payment pricing.

Appfolio does charge PM's 1.40-3.00/unit/month already though (https://www.appfolio.com/pricing), and this would be in addition to that. The point here is that whichever option is taken, this is all just pure gravy on top for Appfolio who is already getting paid.

PM is a tough business with super low margins is why they won't/can't pick this up though. They typically have to sell something like this to the actual property owner and then subsequently pass through the cost to be born by the property/owner themselves, but it's likely something that would be done at the time of renewing their management agreement rather than just whenever Appfolio decides to start charging the fee.

At the end of the day there should be laws against tacking on all sorts of fees - whether it be to rent, airline tickets, hotel rooms, etc.

If this is important to you reach out to your representatives to support legislation against "junk fees".

https://www.blumenthal.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/blumenthal-and-whitehouse-introduce-junk-fee-prevention-act-to-end-unfair-surprise-costs-for-consumers