The Australian Bankers Association (ABA) says the bank fees Australian customers are charged compare favourably with other countries.

A survey by Fujitsu Consulting shows Australians pay an average of 22 per cent more in bank fees than British customers and 11 per cent more than Americans.

But ABA chief executive David Bell says domestic bank fees are fairly reasonable and the banks should be recognised for offering low-cost or fee-free accounts.

"In our own report last year - which we published - it shows that Australia is about middling in terms of account-keeping fees and we're grouped in the same bracket as say, Canada and The Netherlands," Mr Bell said.

"We do know in Australia that the banks have a number of free accounts for people. We also have a lot of low-cost bank accounts in the market which have received terrific uptake."

Research by Fujitsu Consulting says Australian banks will collect about $5 billion in fees this year.

The survey says $2 billion of that relates to transaction accounts and $1.5 billion is tied to credit card fees.

Martin North from Fujitsu told ABC Radio's AM program that Australian banks are less efficient than their overseas counterparts and use fees to make up the cost gap.

"They have to try and recover those costs somehow, but my own view is that there is less competitor tension in Australia than overseas, and as a result, the banks have been able to lift their fees," Mr North said.

"My view is that banks have plenty of opportunity to get more efficient, and if they reduce the number of fees that they have to put into their systems, they would actually be much better off because there would be less costs involved."