So far I’ve been impressed with HSBC Online offering over Emigrant Direct. First off, their bank-to-bank transfers allow electronic sign up and verification via a couple of trial deposits. Which means a whole bunch of accounts that do not issue checks (including Emigrant Direct itself) can be added. The phone representative also mentioned that there’s a maximum of 8 external accounts, which is better than Emigrant’s maximum of 2 and ING Direct’s maximum of 3. The transfers themselves seem to take a little longer – 3-4 business days usually, so unless they’re initiated on Mondays, you end up losing two days’ worth of interest due to the weekend delay.
The ATM card is also a nice add-on. I never use it, but I guess I could at some point.
I love my ING Direct account. It doesn’t have the highest APY but you won’t get better customer service anywhere else. Also, their online interface is just easy and awesome.
I also do still have many referral links left if anyone would like to contact me to receive a link (either for an orange savings account or the electric orange checking/savings account) to sign up for an account. You receive $25 for signing up with a min. of $250 or more. A nice little bonus for nothing! Just shoot me an e-mail @ z3trkrnr@gmail.com and I’ll send the link right back to you!