Within the past month, Santa Monica and San Francisco enacted ordinances prohibiting banks from charging fees to noncustomers who use their automated teller machines. Last Thursday, two of California’s largest banks, Wells Fargo and Bank of America, responded by shutting off its machines to noncustomers. Not by coincidence, it was Veterans’ Day — bank offices were closed and thousands of would-be shoppers were left literally penniless.

A federal judge stepped in a few days later and issued a preliminary injunction against the ATM fee ban. This truce between meddling governments and vindictive businesses is, however, only temporary. The ink on the injunction was still wet when the New York City Council announced plans for its own ban and the failed effort of two years ago in Congress to do the same is being revived.

Rarely has such a small issue been the subject of such demagoguery by those purporting to speak for the public and rarely has a business otherwise so adept at public relations been so inept in its response.

The standard argument against ATM fees is that Americans needing a quick $20 bill should not have to pay $1.50 or $2 for the privilege of withdrawing their money from a bank. This argument ignores the essential fact that in the case of noncustomer use of an ATM, the money is being withdrawn from somebody else’s bank. There are expenses involved in installing and maintaining these convenient machines and if that expense is not shared by all users, it will be borne entirely by customers of that bank.

But the banking industry to a considerable degree asked for this fight. Many large banks have handled deregulation irresponsibily by charging fees for practically every transaction, even for needing to talk to a live teller about a problem with an account. By dunning the customers for services that other businesses view as part of the cost of doing business, these banks turned a fair and modest fee for a true convenience into the straw that broke the consumer’s back.

The California case is good example of going too far. Wells Fargo charged its own customers $2 to take money out of another bank’s ATM. Bank Of America charges noncustomers $1.50. So a Wells Fargo customer would spend $3.50 getting a $20 out of a BOA machine. That is egregious.

In the early days of ATMs, big banks did not charge fees. Smaller banks complained that they were being unfairly harmed since they could not absorb the costs into other operations as easily and the legislatures in 15 states forced banks to charge a reasonable fee for this service. Today there are more than 227,000 ATMs throughout the country, some run by banks, some by businesses that do nothing but run ATMs. To prohibit fees to noncustomers would, of course, have the unintended consequence of forcing these ATM entrepreneurs out of business. The inevitable result would be far fewer ATMs and a significant loss of convenience. Standing in line to get a little walking around money is not progress.

If lawmakers, state or federal, want to do something for bank customers, let them prohibit charges to talk to a real banker. It is a practice that is grossly unfair, especially to those lacking in financial acumen. If bank customers object to getting dunned for $3.50 (and they have every reason to), they should do what generations of disgruntled customers have always done — take their business elsewhere.