timothy86 said:Can we get back to talking about Electric Orange?

Anyone know when it will be available?
The original press releases said "This summer", but one from Aug 11th said "available late this year".

So I guess by the end of the year.

Realistically, unless you keep a large balance in checking, 3% a year isn't going to amount to much.

If your average balance was $500, for example, 3% a year would be $15, or $1.25 a month.

I like ING Direct, and have found that keeping some of our 'emergency fund' in a 6 month CD is a good alternative for getting the higher interest rates. 6 months isn't that long a time...if worse came to worse, and we had a huge immediate emergency, we'd lose 3 months interest, but that isn't the end of the world.

I haven't really explored the other online banks. I've looked at HSBC a few times...

I just know that for regular savings, ING is a lot better than the other local alternatives, including the credit unions.

allegro54 said:Realistically, unless you keep a large balance in checking, 3% a year isn't going to amount to much.

...

It's very handy to have a checking account that earns 4.5% (like Presidential, if you have a direct deposit). You can use it as an intermediary to transfer between other accounts like HSBC, ED, ING, etc. If you have big bill coming up you can get your money there early, without having to worry about last minute delays, and still earn a good rate. For moving around <$25K it is very very handy.

Xeon852 said:timothy86 said:Can we get back to talking about Electric Orange?

Anyone know when it will be available?
The original press releases said "This summer", but one from Aug 11th said "available late this year".

So I guess by the end of the year.

I just logged into my ING account and they had a survey regarding the upcoming "electric orange" accounts. It sounds pretty good to me 5% interest for $50k or more and 3% interest for less than $50k. Plus the ability to send money by email for free.

I'm not sure exactly how that part is going to work with ING but if they were to come up with an account that allows me to accept money online for free/low cost, then PayPal is going out the window. I'm surprised that no banks have jumped onto that kind of thing. PayPal is the big boy on the block but is freakin' expensive. If people could accept/send money straight in and out of their bank account for lower fees, then I think people would move their accounts to the bank that offered such a thing.

Looks like it's Feb 1. Also, there will be free ATM withdrawals at Allpoint ATM's:

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allegro54 said:I just looked up Presidential Bank.

It said, "Coming Soon! ACH transfers in and out of Presidential accounts."

As far as I'm concerned, until that becomes possible, other alternatives are better.

Right now, the only choices for funding those accounts (other than direct deposits) are mail or wire transfers. Mail is time-consuming. Wire transfers cost money.

You misunderstand. You can ACH into or out of Presidential, just like your local bank checking account, by inititiating the ACH transfer from ING or ED or whatever your external online savings is. Fact is, you've always been able to push or pull your money into or out of Presidential through your external account, like ING, ED, HSBC, GMACBank, ELoan, etc. But ACH is available now initiated at Presidential, though I still use ED to pull or push, rather than initiate it through Presidential, since it is faster. If you meet the criteria, there is no better checking than Presidential.

Electric Orange doesn't sound all that great to me. 3%, without any paper checks, and they don't have ATM rebates. Might as well stick with Citi or WaMu 5% combos, or GMAC 5.3% which gives paper checks and ATM rebates. Only benefit is the fact that it's checking and there isn't a 6 withdrawal limit per month.

Citibank, Apple Savings Bank, Bank of America, WaMu, HSBC and others all have 5% + savings accounts.

So why not keep a free checking with little to money in and just transfer the money over when you need to.

Orange doesn't make sense to me.

I really doubt there are more than a handful of people that are not around a bank with 5% savings account or similar.

LOL that was funny, Timothy....yeah...well i tend to agree with you...even with having the allpoint network for free atm access (which does help alot) the rate in Orange Savings hasn't been competitive in a long time, and most people can do better (at least 5%) at the banks you mentioned....

matt1 said:In the third quarter, Ing Direct deposits climbed by $6.9 billion to $47.2 billion. The number of customers nationwide jumped by more than 1 million to 4.4 million.

I guess the question is then how many of those 4.4 million customers will want a checking account without checks. Really depends on the demographic of those customers.

I am sure they do some heavy analysis before they are going to make the investment to start up another service, so good for them if it is profitable. I on the other hand will stick with my Presidential accounts.