I moved to Canada (from UK) and similar situation. Monthly fees, X amount of transactions per month, fee to withdraw from other banks (although we had this in UK too for a few years), fee to pay someone else money whether in the same bank or not and even via the internet.

I tried to deposit a cheque into my landlords account and the bank teller would not accept it, had to be cash or bankers draft - I presume because they may have a limit on the number of transactions per month and anything over wold cost them additional money. I found it very bizarre.