I'm sorry, Timothy, but CITI has to compete with on-line banks. With Net banks, it only takes a couple of clicks to ACH cash into one's checking at CITI or BofA or Wells Fargo.

markkundinger said:True, an ultimate savings, by itself, won't earn any TY points. But I'm a high percentage sure that it would boost your TY point yield if you had a checking account.

Actually, this is what I was referring to. On the product details for the eSavings account under "Rewards" it explicitly states the product counts towards TY points. This statement is missing from the same section of the Ultimate savings account.

timothy86 said:Thanks Dolmar, just opened one.

Now I have an e-savings, ultimate savings and ultimate money!

Whatever one is highest I use and the rest sit at $1.

I don't know why Citibank is confusing everyone with their savings accounts.

I went from 5% -> 4.75% -> 4.5% -> 4.65% -> 5%

Wish I didn't have to have so many savings but oh well.

timothy - where you able to link all 3 savings account to your checking? I currently have my e-savings and cc link to my checking.

Got partway through the application for the Ultimate Money account, and didn't see any mention of any MM-specific maintenance or minimum balance fees.

Here is what it said about the 5.00% rate and

(1) Two rates can be applied to the balance in your Ultimate Money Account. The account earns a rate that is not determined by the balance in your account or your other accounts at Citibank. To qualify for the higher rate, you must make at least two electronic bill payments through Citibank Online, Citi MobileSM or Citiphone Banking® from your linked checking account in a qualifying relationship package during the calendar month preceding the statement cycle date. If the bill payment requirement is not met, a lower rate (currently 4.50% APY) will be applied for that statement cycle.


... So, it sounds like it's an e-savings account, but if you make the two bill pay transactions, you get an extra 0.5%. Keeps getting stranger and stranger.

timothy86 said:Thanks Dolmar, just opened one.

Now I have an e-savings, ultimate savings and ultimate money!

Whatever one is highest I use and the rest sit at $1.

I don't know why Citibank is confusing everyone with their savings accounts.

I went from 5% -> 4.75% -> 4.5% -> 4.65% -> 5%

Wish I didn't have to have so many savings but oh well.

Timmy with thoses Accounts you could get $60K a day from ATM machine. As Citi allows upto $5K per account if you have a Citigold account with a min of $500K between all linked accounts. And with ATM rebates Citi is giving on Citigold accounts now you would never need to worry about not being able to pull out enough money at a strip club ATM machine before hitting your daily limit.

BrotherHesekiel said:"Why bother? Just buy a 28 day ARS from Citibank broker inside the bank currently they are paying between 5.29-5.34% which is an APY of 5.42-5.48% just require as little as $25K . . ."


Hmmm . . . I am a Citibank customer and I had $30K in their 5.5 APY CD until a couple months back and now the cash is sitting in my money market account waiting for an opportunity to do a bit better than 5%. Forgive my ignorance, but I wonder, what's an ARS and how do I sign up?

What part of my statement that you quoted which said "Just buy a 28 day ARS from Citibank broker inside the bank" did you not understand about getting information on them and where to buy them? Do you need me to call your local branch and get the name of the broker assigned to your local branch and make the appointment with the guy for you and then open the brokerage account if you do not currently have one? Maybe you would like me to fund the brokerage account too for you and buy the ARS for you too as a gift.

If I ever had a Citi deposit account, I don't qualify as a new customer? I vaguely remember having a Citi or Chase checking account in the 1980's, but don't remember which it was. Is there a web page where you can see a history of your past accounts? Or anything like that?

Thank you for your kind response.
To answer your question: what I did not understand is what an ARS is.

Anyone done this and seen what the hard inquiry hit is like for credit reports? Last time I opened an account with Citi it hit me with three inquiries across all three major agencies. I already had checking and credit cards there, and was not applying for an account with an overdraft facility. Three hits is severe for an account like this.

I sent a website email asking a couple of dumb questions, and got a few things clarified:

1) You can open up a UMA if you have an existing account relationship, even if it's something other than eChecking.
2) Two billpayments (out of checking) is still the determining factor for if you get the 4.5% rate or the 5.0% rate.
3) I cannot "convert" my e-savings account into a UMA, I need to create a new account with a new account number.