Consumers have been warned that they may have to pay annual charges on debit and credit cards, as EU regulations threaten to end free banking in Britain.
Economists fear that bank customers could also be charged to use cash machines and hold current accounts if plans to impose caps on the fees that card companies impose on retailers go ahead.
So-called interchange fees are collected by banks from businesses each time a consumer uses a debit or credit card to make a purchase. Under the proposed rules, a cap on fees will limit the charges that retailers pay to 0.2 per cent on debit card transactions and 0.3 per cent for credit cards.
The EU hopes that shops will pass on the savings they make