meehawl said: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.

exactly my concern given that I just opened the 4.65 account and some BOA accounts --- --- if I open this now --- I may as well have done an AOR

zimaman said:meehawl said: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.

Opened online, no hard inq's on all 3, and no soft on experian (not sure about Equifax or transunion for soft though).

I opened online while logged into my Citi account and I had no hard Inq's show up on my credit report either. I opened this account on Friday morning just checked right now. Btw I had to fill in no account information either at all it was opened automatically for me as I was logged in. I did not think the credit inquire was worth it to be able to fund this account with a credit card.

andrewli said:dolmar, that's interesting...

I'm seriously considering opening this account as well... did Citi confirm somewhere at funding with CC would result in a credit pull, while opening while logged into Citi and adding it would not?

I was told by CS all new accounts would be hit with a hard credit inquire reguardless if you are new customers or existing customers except I noticed in the past when I opened a CD with $500 just for Thank You Points while logged in no hard pull was done. When I opened Ultimate Savings with out being logged in so I would be able to fund with my credit card I was hit with a hard pull on all 3 credit agencies. So this time I opened it while being logged into my account and no hard pulls at all. So I assume maybe Citi web page is smart enough to let you open accounts as an existing customer without pulling your credit while at branch and over the phone because they ask for all your information again or maybe the way they are paid it is better for them to open your account as new customers they do pull your credit. Ie maybe they get paid more commision for opening new customer accounts over existing.

I opened e-savings, closed it after few days due to profile screwup on citi's side, no soft/hard pull
Then opened another e-savings, no hard pull/no soft pull either
Finally opened the UMA @ 5% APY and no hard pull/soft pull either

every time I've went to the service menu and selected open new account while logged on.

I think this is the little trick...

I opened the account last week with no problem. No hard pull on my CR.
I set up two autopays of $1 each to my two most used credit cards, so I don't forget the required bill-pays.

TYTBUDGET said:You know what just kills me about this new account? Having to reprogram all my bill payments! I (grudgingly) can live with having to create new accounts with Citibank . . . just to retain what I originally signed up for; what kills me is having to spend an hour reprogramming everything from all the different payee sites (Chase, PG&E, AIG, NAPA et al. and ad nauseum). Why the hell couldn't Citibank just increase the rate on the eSavings account and spare us all this hassle? I realize a lot of you don't like Citibank, but I actually do like them. I have business accounts with them, and they're everywhere. But to see my old rate show up as a different account is truly a slap in the face.

Tytie

I dont understand the big deal. You can send your self two $1 checks a months which you can turn right around and deposit back into Citibank. Or do like I did and just make 2 $1 payements to one of your utilities 1 on the 5th of the month and other on 25th of the month. And then pay your bill rest of the time like normal. The lost interest on $2 over a whole month is nothing vs being able to earn 5% on your local funds.

Took me a whole 5 mins to set this up.

Btw not sure why you are shocked Citibank also pulls this stupid stuff. Back all in the 80, 90 and early 2000's. Every time the fed increased rates you had to open a new Money Market Fund in the branches because they never increased the rates on the old ones. It seems Citi thinks most people are too lazy to open a new account or just do know when rates increase. So Citi always plays this game.

How are we going to know they did the 5% and not the 4.5%?

Will it say it on the statement or will we have to calculated it by hand?

If it were 5% interest to calculate by hand we would do:

0.0488*AVGBALANCE*AMOUNTOFSTATEMENTDAYS/365 and it should equal the interest if we had 5%.

Is that correct?

TYTBUDGET said:You know what just kills me about this new account? Having to reprogram all my bill payments! I (grudgingly) can live with having to create new accounts with Citibank . . . just to retain what I originally signed up for; what kills me is having to spend an hour reprogramming everything from all the different payee sites (Chase, PG&E, AIG, NAPA et al. and ad nauseum). Why the hell couldn't Citibank just increase the rate on the eSavings account and spare us all this hassle? I realize a lot of you don't like Citibank, but I actually do like them. I have business accounts with them, and they're everywhere. But to see my old rate show up as a different account is truly a slap in the face.

Tytie

agreed. citi too often behaves more like a bad used car dealer than a real bank. even its own csrs sometimes can't understand the fine print. why does citi need so many types of money market accounts, all with floating rates other than to confuse trusting customers.

dolmar said:I dont understand the big deal. You can send your self two $1 checks a months which you can turn right around and deposit back into Citibank.
Oh, I can do many things (including what you've just suggested); nonetheless, being manipulated in this fashion reflects Citibank's contempt for its account holders. Adding layers of excessive, unnecessary transactional data to my Citibank accounts — just to maintain terms I originally had with them under an account they've reconstituted as something else for no apparent reason other than to waste more of my time — is truly a slap in the face.

Tytie

dpid said:I did that, and worked.
I also saw this under the offer:
"Rewards:* ThankYouSM Points - This product counts as one of the three products or services required to help you earn ThankYou Points.3"

Correct this will count as a Money Market/Savings Account just be aware of it if you have this account and an E-savings or any other savings/money market account you will still only get credit for 1 product not 2 products. Citibank Thank you points are calculated based on how many different products types you have with Citibank and not accounts.

Ie if you have E-Z Checking and 7 savings accounts Citibank considers this 2 products even tho you have 8 accounts total.