Annoying

[Bateluer]

I currently have checking and savings accounts at two different financial institutions, a bank of a credit union. At present, the bank is located in my home state of MI, and its where my pay checks are direct deposited to. I like them, they don't charge fees for online banking, checking accounts, or savings accounts, no matter what my balance is. I use the credit union where I currently work, in AZ. Since my home bank offers free bill pay services through their online functions, its easy to transfer funds to the credit union accounts when I need local bank services.

The problem is, that all four accounts are easily accessed. This produces a kind of slow leak on my funds, because I can access any account, using my VISA debit cards.

To stop this, I sought to open a savings account at a Bank of America, whose branches are available locally, if I need them. I was going to set up an allotment that would come directly out of my pay check and deposit into the BoA savings account.

The thing that irritates me is this. You can open the BoA Regular Savings account with $100 USD, but if you have $300 or less, they charge you a monthly maintenance fee of $3. I see plenty of commercials for 'Free Checking'. How come one of the largest banks in the US can't offer free savings accounts? Not to mention that they only have a .5% interest rate, but thats fairly standard.

BankOne charges $3 per month regardless of your balance, if I am reading their site correctly.

Kinda irritates me, I wanted a way to save more money that would be aided by my natural laziness.

 

[Hossenfeffer]

I have a Washington Mutual savings account that boggles me to this day. It, too, has a minimum $300 balance. The thing is, if you set up an automatic transfer from checking to savings, the $3 fee is waived. But I can just transfer that money right back to checking and the fee is still nonexistant. Actually had one of the CSR's suggest that to me after I called and notified them that I was a complete moron and had been paying $3 fees monthly (or quarterly, can't recall) for 6-7 years.

 

[Baked]

Don't open a BofA savings account (I only use them for Checking), go open an Orange Savings account @ INGDirect.com. No minimum balance, no fees, no catch. Awsome 3% rate which will raise again soon since the feds have raised the interests. You can setup auto transfer every month from your other bank account to Orange Savings account. PM me if you need a referal to start you off w/ $25 when you open the Orange Savings account.