BANKING

Fees Collected for Bad Checks Called Excessive: Banks earned billions of dollars last year in “excess profits” on fees for bounced checks, a consumer group said. The Consumer Federation of America said the commercial banking industry generated nearly $3.67 billion in profits from bounced checks--in which customers wrote checks without having sufficient funds in their accounts--in 1992. Fees typically range from $10 to $20 per check. Industrywide, those charges totaled $4.35 billion in 1992--or more than six times the $685-million cost of handling those checks, the group said.