SoFi Plans to Charge for Features That Used to Be Free (But at Least You Can Open Another Checking Account)

Neobank SoFi used to offer a smorgasbord of features to win over customers from other digital banks — high interest on savings, free access to a Certified Financial Planner, and a boost on cashback from its credit card. But starting in April, SoFi members will have to start paying for many of these perks instead of earning them the old-fashioned way.

• SoFi previously offered these benefits at no cost, but will now bundle them as part of a new “SoFi Plus” for $10/mo — advertising 20+ perks and $1K in annual value.
• Thankfully, the bank’s 3.3% savings rate will still be available to those who directly deposit their paychecks at least once per month, with no minimum required.

Is this a dealbreaker? It never feels good when a company takes away benefits that used to be free, but it’s likely unsustainable to reward all customers equally. More importantly, SoFi needs to create reasons for users to adopt all of their products end-to-end, including their brokerage and retirement accounts, which now offer a Robinhood-like match on contributions. Is that worth it for most? Probably not if they were using SoFi anyway, but we’ll ultimately get to see.

New feature alert: On the bright side, at least you can now open a separate, joint SoFi Checking and Savings account on the platform. It’s unclear how many ‘neobank customers’ are married and banking together, but hey, times are changing.