Savings Account - WalletPop

A different, slightly cheaper kind of overdraft protection

Martha C. White Jan 22nd 2010 @ 9:00AM EST Filed Under: Banks, Banking - Checking Account, Banking - Savings Account

Let's get the obvious out of the way first: We don't want you to overdraw your checking account. Spending more money than you actually have is not ideal, to say the least, and always winds up costing you more -- sometimes much more -- in the long run.

But banks made more than $38 billion in overdraft fees alone in 2009, so it's apparent that a lot of Americans are spending more money than they have in their checking accounts.

New rules about overdraft fees kick in this coming July. As we've pointed out in other posts, though, this doesn't mean you're off the hook if you try to buy something when you account balance is at zero. Rather, you'll just get slapped with an "insufficient funds" fee, which can cost as much as that overdraft "protection" fee you thought you were avoiding.

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Will customers have to say goodbye to free checking?

Martha C. White Jan 21st 2010 @ 11:00AM EST Filed Under: Banks, Banking - Checking Account, Banking - Savings Account

There's a lot of good stuff going on as far as the government cracking down on the way banks and credit-card companies have been treating their customers lately. The CARD Act kicks into gear next month, and Federal Reserve rules that come into play this summer will stop the frustrating practice of being automatically enrolled in overdraft "protection" programs that zing you for $35 if you go into the red. But there's a drawback to these reforms: Banks are still going to be looking for ways to make money.

Banks were expected to make $38.5 billion from overdraft charges alone in 2009, so they're going to want to make up that shortfall -- along with the money their credit-card units earn that will be curbed thanks to the CARD Act -- somehow. One way they'll probably do it is by reducing or eliminating free checking.

This Bankrate.com article points out that offers of free checking have been dwindling, and many "free" checking programs now come with conditions or catches, such as minimum balance requirements or direct deposit. The article also suggests that customers who want to keep free checking might be limited to online- and ATM-based transactions only. Translation: If you want to speak to a real human being, you'll have to pony up.

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The "move your money" movement gets noticed

Martha C. White Dec 31st 2009 @ 9:00AM EST Filed Under: Banks, Banking - Checking Account, Banking - Savings Account

An online media maven is urging Americans to switch banks, and she wants her crusade to go viral. On the Huffington Post website, founder Arianna Huffington introduces what she calls the "move your money" campaign. The idea is to get Americans -- all Americans -- to close their accounts at big banks and transplant their personal finances to smaller banks. The budding cause has its own web site, moveyourmoney.info, including a link where you can plug in your zip code and find a list of smaller banks.

Huffington singles out the Big Four banks (that would be Bank of America, Citi, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo) for particular ire, pointing out that they've curbed business lending even since receiving TARP money. She urges Americans to park their money at community banks instead of these TARP-receiving behemoths.

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Bank deposit error in your favor? Give it back

Janean Chun Dec 9th 2009 @ 1:00PM EST Filed Under: Banks, Extracurriculars, Banking - Checking Account, Banking - Savings Account

Remember when Uncle Billy in It's a Wonderful Life loses the bank deposit, and George's troubles ensue (and a holiday classic is born)? Or when Loretta Castorini in Moonstruck forgets a bank deposit as part of a series of comedic misunderstandings? Bank deposit bloopers happen in real-life as well, but the dollar amounts are considerably higher and the bank deposit bloopers are often caused by the bank, not the customer. And, the end-results of these bank deposit bloopers are, unfortunately, not always as heartwarming as in the movies.

Take Randy and Melissa Marie Pratt, whose perceived windfall turned into jail time, when they took an erroneous bank deposit and ran. Melissa made a bank deposit to FNB Bank in the summer of 2008 of $1,772.50, but the bank read the check as $177,250. When the central Pennsylvania couple saw the difference in their bank balance, they wrote checks to another account, quit their jobs, bought a new vehicle and moved to Orlando, Fla. They were in the process of buying a house before the bank deposit mistake was traced.

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Why 30 million Americans lack banking services

Martha C. White Dec 7th 2009 @ 1:00PM EST Filed Under: Banks, Banking - Checking Account, Banking - Savings Account

More than a million Americans lost access to banks last year, bringing the total up to 30 million people in this country who can't even open a savings account or write a check. The issue of the "unbanked," as they're being called, is a serious one, and the recession is only making the problem worse.

According to the FDIC, which compiled the stats, poor, immigrant and minority members of society are most likely to have trouble finding a bank. In total, a whopping 25.6 percent of all citizens are unbanked or "underbanked," a situation which makes their day-to-day financing more expensive and makes it extremely difficult for them to attain upward mobility.

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From savings rates to budget programs, WalletPop experts answer personal finance questions

Lan N. Nguyen Dec 2nd 2009 @ 3:30PM EST Filed Under: Budgets, Banking - Savings Account

With experts predicting that unemployment figures haven't bottomed out, it's no surprise that Americans continue to hold tight to their wallets. To help, WalletPop wants to answer your questions about security, investing and other financial matters. Here's this month's sample:

Question: What is the best savings interest rates right now? The INGdirect account is a good deal, everyone knows that. But if you have a MMA(money market account) linked to your checking it's easier to get your money in and out fast as you need it -- the downside is that the interest rate is lower and banks also have weird minimums sometimes for the better rates. Which banks are doing comparable rates to ingdirect and which ones have better deals as far as no minimum/low minimum?

-- Craig Pavia, 38, publisher, Long Island City

Answer from Gregory Karp, author of The 1-2-3 Money Plan and Living Rich by Spending Smart:

Great question. Everybody is looking to earn a little more on savings. But the fact is, interest rates are low right now. So, it's not like you'll find double-digit savings rates.

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ING bank offers Black Friday deals

Martha C. White Nov 25th 2009 @ 1:30PM EST Filed Under: Banks, Saving Money, Black Friday, Banking - Checking Account, Banking - Savings Account

The down side of saving a big chunk of change on Black Friday is that you usually have to spend a lot of money to realize those savings. That's why we at Walletpop were happy to see a Black Friday deal that is literally just about the savings.

On Black Friday, online bank ING Direct will announce special interest rates for opening a CD or the brand's signature Electric Orange checking account (they're keeping mum on the details of those rates until Friday but have added a teaser page to their Web site).

This blog has details of two other promotions, though: a $683 discount off an ING mortgage (the amount is the average dollar cost Americans spend on holiday gifts annually, according to the National Retail Federation) as well as a Cyber Monday 20% discount on trades through ShareBuilder, its trading subsidiary.

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Low interest rates good for borrowers, bad for savers

Martha C. White Nov 23rd 2009 @ 5:30PM EST Filed Under: Banks, Banking - Savings Account

Americans are saving more of their earnings than they have in years, and that's a good thing. But unfortunately, we're not being rewarded for it the way we were in flusher years.

By now, everyone has heard about the government's unprecedented actions to drop interest rates to historic lows so cash-strapped individuals, businesses and banks can borrow on more forgiving terms. The down side of this is that bank account holders are now getting rock-bottom interest returns on their money.

Currently, we're saving around 3% of our collective income. That's not really an achievement to be proud of -- not yet, anyway --- but it's still a great step up from where we were a couple of years ago when the U.S. had a negative savings rate, meaning that we as a nation were literally spending more than we made.

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My 5-year-old opens a savings account -- you can, too

Aaron Crowe Nov 9th 2009 @ 4:00PM EST Filed Under: Banks, Banking - Savings Account

As with too many lessons I try to teach my daughter, now 5, I end up caving in and the lesson I set out to instill is lost.

We'll see if it turns out the same way with her savings account we recently opened together, but it couldn't have been a strong lesson in how to save money when immediately after leaving the bank, we went to a store where I bought her a promised toy.

I'll get back to the toy spending in a bit, but first I'd like to focus on the good part of that afternoon -- opening a savings account in her name in an effort to teach her about saving money.

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