Online Banking for Miles
 

Now that Netbank is offering United (www.netbank.com/united) and Delta (www.netbank.com/delta) miles for online banking, does anyone have any comments on Netbank? Or comments on other online banks and whether those compare favorably?

The online thread I've found on Netbank is
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/008285.html

That was when they were only giving Priority Club points.

Basically, I'm looking for an online checking account with ATM access. Netbank appears to waive ATM surcharges but most ATMs themselves will charge a surcharge.. so most ATM withdrawals look like they'll cost ~ $2.

They have free online bill pay but they charge if you DON'T use it. (weird)

The first check order is free.

Up to 4500 miles for opening the checking account, 2500 miles for a money market.

So.. 4500 miles isn't alot if I'm giving up something. But I want to move my checking account anyway, so I just need to decide where to move it.

I'd sign up right now if there were ongoing incentives -- but the only incentive appears to be for OPENING the account, not for keeping it open or for keeping balances.

Thoughts?

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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

Most online banks offer ATM fee rebates. I looked through the Netbank site and could not find anything so I'm surprised that they don't do that. For instance, I use State Farm Bank and they give me up to $5/month in ATM rebates.

There is a current thread on Internet only banks at Fat Wallet with some comments about Netbank.

Many Credit Unions do not charge to use their ATM machines as a visitor. Also, in Florida (at least last time I was there) Publix did not charge to use their ATM machine.

Additionally, if you use your ATM card to pay for groceries or in Walmart or stores who offer cash back, there is normally not an extra fee to use the card to pay or get cash back.

I used NetBank in the past (way back) but after I got all set up and used them for two months, they cancelled giving airline miles. So, concern would be they could cancel this program without notice at any time and may do that.

I don't know about NetBank, but I'm looking into Bank Direct right now. They offer AA miles, 1000 miles to start, and various miles for checking, MM, CDs, bill pay, etc. I think they pay .5% less interest on their mileage accounts.

http://www.bankdirect.com/frames_01....aadvantage.asp

I signed up for a NetBank Money Market account a few months ago and received the 10,000 Holiday Inn Priority Club bonus points. (That offer may be over now, I'm not sure). It was a great deal in my view for only a $250 deposit. In addition, the Money Market account has no fees associated with it as long as you maintain the $250 minimum and choose on-line statements. You can close the account after 6 months. The account doesn't have bill pay or an ATM card associated with it (so no fees there), but yields are close to 2% right now which is excellent. You do get free checks, but are limited to using 3 (?) per month. No inactivity fees on the money market account either.

The checking account doesn't appear to be as good a deal unless you plan on making it your primary checking account.

BankDirect will rebate ATM fees (up to 4 times a month @ $2.50ea). Netbank will not.

BankDirect has a $15/mo fee on accounts with < $2500. Netbank doesn't (although NetBank has it's own funky fees, like if you sign up for their free bill pay service but don't use it.)

Bankdirect gives miles on an ongoing basis, Netbank does not.

Frustrating.

If NetBank would rebate ATM fees, I'd sign up.

If Bankdirect didn't require $2500 balance in checking to avoid fees, I'd sign up.

Frustrating.



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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

NetBank is pretty awesome. I joined myself a couple weeks ago.

Interest Rates are the highest. You get miles for DirectDeposit/Billpay/ect. It is partnered with Ameritrade (more miles!). You can go to Walmart/Eckerds and get cashback for free. And the CS there is great.


This is my first post!

I really like this website. I am loooking for some ways to earn some miles and go traveling.

Oh yeah, and there is also a $50 sign-up bonus for Netbank. I wonder if you could combine that with the FF miles offer? Doubt it.

Paul

Welcome to FT, Beck446 - or should I say NetbankEmployee446 ? http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

I used Netbank for almost two years. Honestly, the ATM fee thing is a non-issue, because they usually pay you enough in interest to offset a good protion of what you pay in fees. Their online interface is easy, and support easy to get.

I would recommend them to anyone.

I just signed up with them. Their site says if you have direct deposit, there's no monthly fee. Easy enough. I already do that.

I use Netbank to pay all my utility and credit card bills. It's a lot easier (and slightly cheaper) than writing out and mailing checks! I barely buy stamps anymore. Also, I noticed many of the bills were received by the companies the next day.

I just started a bankdirect account and since they give ongoing mileage for balances, I will most likely close my netbank and transfer everything to bankdirect.

As other people have mentioned already, I barely run into this problem. I usually get cash on my weekly/biweekly run to the grocery store, or Washington Mutual where their ATMs don't charge fees.

The interest rate difference between netbank and bankdirect are so insignifant to me (unless my balance was like a million dollars!).

My experience with Netbank has not been bad at all and i would say average. Everything is done by mail or internet, which is ok. They have an 800 number to call if you do need personal assistance which I have used and they were very friendly.

I've used Netbank for nearly 2 years (first I had an account with Compubank and then Netbank bought them) and haven't had a single problem. Decent website, excellent customer support.

To be honest, I was with Netbank for about a year (2001) and I thought they were horrible. I had an account with compubank (which was great!), and then they were bought out by Netbank. I had mainly three issues with Netbank. First, they were very slow depositing checks into my account (at least 10 days from when I sent them in). Second, there interest rates were very low at the time relative to other online checking accounts (not sure about this now). Third, they don't pay for your ATM withdrawals. Both Compubank and First Internet Bank of Indiana (who I'm with now) pay up to $6/month in ATM fees. From my experience there are better online banking products that are also less costly than Netbank.

I can't find that on the BankDirect site. That plus the AA miles would tip me... could you point me to it?

Thanks!

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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

As far as I know you can get 5K AA miles for signing up for payroll direct deposit into a Mileage Checking Account and another 2K miles for using BankDirect's bill pay service for 12 months

If somebody wants to be referred to BankDirect so both of us could get an extra 1K AA miles - just let me know


[This message has been edited by palex (edited 07-04-2003).]

What I was referring to.. I don't see the $15/mo fee for accounts with less than $2500 waived if you do direct deposit.

I see the MILES for direct deposit... but not that it waives fees.

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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

I was like several others here in that I had a Compubank acct that was bought out by NetBank.

I no longer have that acct due to poor service of Netbank. As long as everything is fine and easy...you wont have any problems w/ NetBank. But isn't that true w/ any company? Sometimes I talked to supervisors that were down right rude. They made me mad a couple of times. The front line csr's weren't like that but they also didn't have any authority. The supervisors are into cya...big time!

I'm sooooo sorry!!! I got my online banks messed up. I just signed up for Guaranty
Bank's Airmiles checking! I thought I read somewhere about no monthly fees with direct deposit but now I can't find it....they might be getting a phone call from me....

I signed up for BankDirect a couple years ago, kept a balance of $2500+ to avoid fees, got lots of miles for direct deposit, and closed my account about 4 months later almost 8,000 AA miles richer http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif
(I believe you pay fees for a balance under 2500 - even with direct deposit)

In looking at BankDirect's website, if you have a lot of money, it looks like you can achieve AA Gold or Platinum status in record time. Their money market checking account gives you 100 miles per month per $1000 account balance. Just deposit $10 million for one month, and you hit lifetime gold. Leave it on deposit for another month, and you have lifetime platinum. Anyone want to loan me $10 million for two months? http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

If you've got a spare $10mm, do you need elite status?

Someone please correct me if I"m wrong, but wouldn't you have a hard time getting thousands of dollars in cash (or a cashier's check) if you needed it quickly from an internet-only bank?

I bank with a major regional bank that has branches in plenty of grocery stores and such which are open on weekends. I've had the following kinds of occasions:

1. Recently I was looking for a used car. I found a FANTASTIC deal from a private party on a Friday, saw the car that Saturday at noon, and if I hadn't been able to rush to that grocery store branch office to get a cashier's check within the hour, the next person seeing the car an hour after me would likely have driven away with it. Now, I didn't need a cashier's check per se, but the only other option was cash, and my understanding is that ATMs typically limit you to a few hundred a day cash withdrawal, which would have meant I would have had to have been withdrawing cash for WEEKS to pay for this car. How/could I have bought this car (with so little advance notice that it would be available) had I been using an internet-only bank?

2. A couple years ago my ATM card was damaged (no longer worked with my PIN), right when I very much needed to do some transactions. Not only was I able to eventually (tho it took a couple tries at different branches before it worked) to get the ATM card reprogrammed with my PIN correctly, but I was in the meantime able to use tellers at the branches to do the transactions I absolutely had to do then. What would have happened had I had been with an internet-only bank?

Let me further point out that I've gone for many years at a time between being in situations like this. It doesn't change that when I have been in situations like this, I needed things resolved immediately, and couldn't wait necessarily even for FedEx (if that's even an option in situations like this with internet-only banks). So I don't care how rarely I have a need for a physical bank, if I EVER have a need for one (where not having one would likely cost me much more than what 4500 miles are worth), why would I want to risk it for just 4500 miles?

Of course, YMMV. But I suggest you consider rare cases, not just your everyday usage of banks, when making this decision.

I'd wire the funds to whomever needed them. Gets the $$$ in their account faster than giving them a cashiers check.

But, frankly, I'm just talking about my checking account here. (Although I could be talking about a money market as well.)

Fortunately for me, I'm not talking about every dime under the coach. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

I think I've tried all of the major online banks over the past few years. Other than two that went out of business (Wingspan and Lighthouse--both were absorbed back into their bricks and mortar parent banks) the best I've found so far is First Internet Bank of Indiana. I know, it sounds a little goofy--but they are profitable and provide a really good product and excellent customer service. Fee-free for a $500 minimum balance, ATM fee reimbursement, fee bill payment, etc.

I recently opened an online account with Citibank also. I wanted a bank with more of an international presence as I travel abroad a lot. The account opening process was rather byzantine and frustrating. For example, they won't give you an account unless they can call you at home and have you answer the phone. It's not good enough for you to call them back in response to their message (never mind that I already have two credit cards with them). But in spite of that, once you get set up the product is decent. You do need to keep $1500 in the account to avoid fees, but if you live outside of their service area (mainly NYC, I assume) they will reimburse ATM fees. They also gave me $100 to open the account (found the link somewhere here on FT). I think they are offering $150 now. The links can be found in this fatwallet forum Unfortunately I have found Citi's customer service to be sub-par.

So bottom line, I didn't find the mileage offers to be worth the hassle. I didn't like the product offered by any of those banks and found you really have to pay attention to avoid fees--they're tricky! My advice: if this is going to be your primary checking account make sure you pick a bank with good customer service.

As for the concerns raised by Stefan Daystrom above, I found the service offered by any of the major banks in New England following all of the consolidation over the past few years to be simply horrible. So I'm perfectly happy to give my business to an online bank. I can't imagine any situation where I wouldn't be able to get at my money if I needed it. Maybe my needs are simpler than his.

NetBank has been good to me. Free billpay is a big time saver.

All you got to remember is to at least have one activity every three months. If you use it like me to pay most of my bills, that won't be a problem for you.

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AirmileOffers.com

[This message has been edited by milehunter (edited 07-07-2003).]

I didn't read all the posts because it's late and I'm tired. However, I did read the first post and since you live in the DC area, I recommend that you check out Acacia Bank - www.afsbonline.com. They're located in Falls Church off of Rt. 7 near Tysons/495 exit. They refund upto 10.00 in ATM fees/month and if you keep a minimum balance of 1,000 they don't charge you. You won't earn any airline miles, but it's worth it if you use cash - i've got 2 accounts with them so I can get upto 20/month refunded.