For the more than 7 million Americans receiving SSI benefits, managing money shouldn't require a law degree and constant vigilance. Yet the banking industry continues to design products that actively work against people on disability benefits—charging fees that eat into fixed incomes, offering no tools to track resource limits, and providing customer service that doesn't understand the unique rules SSI recipients must follow. This isn't a new problem, but it's one that big banks show little interest in solving.
In this article, we'll cover:
- How traditional bank accounts fail SSI and SSDI recipients
- The real cost of overdraft fees and minimum balance requirements on fixed incomes
- Why resource limit tracking matters and banks don't offer it
- Accessibility gaps that exclude people with disabilities
- The representative payee problem banks ignore
- What the disability community actually needs from financial services
Banking Products Weren't Built for You
Walk into any major bank and try to explain that you need an account that helps you stay under $2,000 in resources to keep your SSI benefits. You'll likely get a blank stare. Traditional checking and savings accounts are designed for people trying to grow their money, not for people who face benefit cuts if they accidentally save too much.
This fundamental mismatch creates daily stress for SSI recipients. Every deposit requires mental math: Will this push me over the limit? Do I need to spend down before the first of the month? What counts and what doesn't? Banks offer no help answering these questions because their systems weren't built with benefit compliance in mind.
The situation is similar for representative payees—the family members, friends, and organizations who manage benefits for people unable to handle their own finances. Banks treat representative payee accounts as an afterthought, offering clunky solutions that make it difficult to keep beneficiary funds separate, track spending for Social Security reporting, and manage the administrative requirements that come with this responsibility.
The Fee Trap
Overdraft fees hit people on fixed incomes the hardest. When you're living on $967 per month and every dollar is allocated before it arrives, a single mistimed transaction can trigger a $35 fee—and then another, and another. A small miscalculation can cost $100 or more in fees, money that was supposed to cover food or medication.
Big banks made over $8 billion in overdraft fees in recent years, much of it from customers who could least afford it. While some banks have reduced or eliminated these fees under regulatory pressure, many still charge them, and the industry's overall approach remains punitive rather than protective.
Minimum balance requirements create another barrier. Many accounts waive monthly fees only if you maintain a balance of $500, $1,000, or more. For someone who must stay under a $2,000 resource limit while also paying rent and buying groceries, maintaining a minimum balance is often impossible. The result is monthly maintenance fees of $10, $12, or $15—small amounts that add up to $120-180 per year, a meaningful sum when you're living on SSI.
These fees aren't accidents or oversights. They're business model choices that prioritize extracting revenue from vulnerable customers over serving their actual needs.
No Tools for Resource Tracking
The $2,000 SSI resource limit is one of the most consequential numbers in a recipient's financial life. Go over it, even briefly, and you risk losing benefits. Yet no major bank offers tools to help customers track their countable resources or alerts when they're approaching the limit.
This gap is striking when you consider what banks do offer. They'll send you alerts for low balances, unusual spending, bill due dates, and credit score changes. They've built sophisticated systems to track every aspect of your financial life—except the one that matters most if you're on SSI.
The technology to solve this problem isn't complicated. A simple dashboard showing countable resources, automatic alerts before you hit the limit, and guidance about what counts toward the limit would transform the banking experience for SSI recipients. Banks simply haven't bothered to build it because the disability community isn't their priority market.
Some recipients resort to keeping manual spreadsheets, setting phone reminders to check balances before the first of the month, or intentionally spending down to stay safe. These workarounds take time and mental energy that could be spent on other aspects of life—and they don't always work. A single forgotten deposit or delayed transaction can push someone over the limit despite their best efforts.
Accessibility Remains an Afterthought
Beyond the structural problems with how accounts work, basic accessibility continues to lag at major financial institutions. Bank websites and apps often fail to meet accessibility standards for screen readers, making them difficult or impossible to use for customers with visual impairments. Branch locations may lack adequate accessibility features, and staff training on disability-related needs is inconsistent at best.
Phone-based customer service presents its own challenges. Long hold times are frustrating for anyone but can be particularly difficult for people with certain disabilities. When you finally reach a representative, explaining SSI rules or representative payee requirements often means educating them on the basics before you can address your actual question.
The Americans with Disabilities Act requires equal access, but compliance is uneven and enforcement is slow. Many people with disabilities have simply accepted that banking will be harder for them than for everyone else—a resignation that shouldn't be necessary in 2025.
The Representative Payee Gap
More than 8 million Americans have representative payees managing their Social Security benefits. These payees—often family members caring for loved ones with disabilities—take on significant responsibility, including keeping detailed records of how benefits are spent and reporting annually to Social Security.
Banks make this job harder than it needs to be. Opening a representative payee account often requires multiple branch visits, extensive documentation, and interactions with staff unfamiliar with the process. Once open, these accounts rarely offer features that help with the actual work of being a payee: categorizing expenses, generating reports, keeping beneficiary funds clearly separate from the payee's own money.
Organizations serving as representative payees for multiple beneficiaries face even greater challenges. Managing dozens or hundreds of accounts through systems designed for individual consumers creates administrative burdens that drive up costs and limit how many people these organizations can serve.
The result is that becoming a representative payee—already a significant commitment—comes with banking friction that discourages people from taking on the role. This hurts the beneficiaries who need someone trustworthy to manage their finances.
What the Disability Community Actually Needs
The banking needs of SSI and SSDI recipients aren't mysterious. They need accounts without predatory fees that punish people for being poor. They need tools that help track resources against benefit limits, with clear alerts before problems occur. They need accessible interfaces that work for people with various disabilities. They need customer service representatives who understand benefit programs. And representative payees need accounts designed for their specific responsibilities.
None of this is technically difficult. Challenger banks and fintech companies have proven that it's possible to build accounts without overdraft fees, with sophisticated tracking and alerts, with modern accessible apps. The barrier isn't technology—it's priorities.
Big banks have decided that serving the disability community well isn't worth their investment. The market is too small, the margins too thin, the regulatory complexity too high. So they offer the same products they offer everyone else and let SSI recipients figure out how to make them work.
This is a choice, and it's the wrong one. The disability community deserves financial products built for their reality, not adapted as an afterthought. Until big banks recognize this, the community will continue to be underserved by institutions that should be helping them build financial stability.
You deserve a bank account that works with your benefits, not against them. Purple was built specifically for people receiving SSI and SSDI, with tools to track your resources, avoid fees, and stay compliant with program rules.