So have been too much of a status quo guy and never really asked financial questions. But getting to that point.
Have been with CBA nearly all my life, but wanting to know if I should be smarter and move to someone else.
Info of what we have/n't with CBA
Wife has looked at a few others but wanting the wisdom from OZBargain
no cash deposit 24/7 either, how do you pay cash into it?
I'm with CBA for my main account, the pro's out weigh the cons.
I have ING for savings but also have savings in CBA because its takes 2 days to transfer from ING.
Good point about deposits, I don't really make cash deposits.
I find ING is very quick with sending/receiving money. I heard they process cash transfers several times / day, and that CBA only do it twice per day.
Can you use a deposit enabled ATM by any other bank to make cash deposits?
@tsunamisurfer: I have never tried, but probably not.
I'll give it a try at lunch time (I have a $50 in my wallet on this rare occasion).
EDIT: Looks like you can make deposits at Australia Post
http://auspost.com.au/pol/app/locate
So as tuzii said above, no 24/7 cash deposits, it would only be possible during business hours.
i think youre wrong about the processing of transfers, because my half my pay pay goes into my CBA account the same day as work pays me while the other half is in the ING acct a day after pay day.
CBA has real time processing, which is major plus for everyone.
https://www.commbank.com.au/personal/private-real-time-banki…
@tuzii: I could very well be wrong.
I used to receive my pay from Westpac -> CBA, the following day.
Does your employer happen to be banking with CBA as well? Because that could explain the fast transfer.
Either way; if you can get a big4 bank with no fees to make use of 24/7 cash deposits, coin counting machines, then it's worth having.
I tend to like having lots of different no-fee bank accounts and Amex's to toggle through free 1 month trials, etc as well.
@idonotknowwhy:
work pays with St George so there should be a be a delay, how pay is processed at 3pm, and its in my CBA account at 7PM
@tuzii: not sure about the real time processing. I have paid cash over the counter at a branch into birth my cheque and visa accounts. Money has only been available in my account the next day even though I have been assured it will be there straight away.
+1 for ING. The receiving is usually the same day (for salaries) from ANZ.
It is now my major bank and their APP and Apple Pay is great!
For 24 hours deposit, I have another NAB bank account so you can always make the deposit and then transfer it to ING (with delays of course).
ING is generally quicker for me (faster than CBA, NAB and ANZ) - it depends how many times your remitting bank clears with ING each day. It's likely St George is only clearing with ING once, opposed to the major banks 2-3+ times
CBA are incredibly fast when sending or receiving money - in my experience.
By far the best bank available to Australians is ING. They have two very useful accounts: Orange Everyday (a transaction account) and Savings Maximiser (a savings account).
The transaction account comes with a Visa debit card which you can use for Apple Pay, Android Pay, EFTPOS at checkout (and when you withdraw $200 or more your account is credited with a $0.50 bonus), and at any ATM in Australia for free (the full amount of any fees charged is instantly refunded).
The savings account pays a rate of 3.00 % p.a. which is the highest available.
The way I and most others use these accounts is we have both. We get our pay or move income ($1000/month) into the savings account to earn high interest and move small amounts monthly, weekly or as needed into the transaction account. Transfers between the accounts are processed instantly online even after hours and on weekends and public holidays! So you really get the best of both worlds, high interest on your savings and fee free transactions including at any ATM in Australia. ING also deliver excellent customer service.
Transfers between the accounts are processed instantly online even after hours and on weekends and public holidays! So you really get the best of both worlds, high interest on your savings and fee free transactions including at any ATM in Australia. ING also deliver excellent customer service.
I didn't know you could get your pay directly into the savings maximizer! Thanks, I'll make this change too, I've been doing it the other way, paid into Orange everyday and then transferring to savings maximizer.
I love that it's so fast to transfer between accounts via the app.
I needed to withdraw $70 at the airport recently and had $75 in the account, but the shitty atm only did $50 denominations. I quickly whipped out my phone and sent $30 across, then hit OK on the ATM and it worked.
if you can get a big4 bank with no fees to make use of 24/7 cash deposits, coin counting machines, then it's worth having.
That would be NAB then, they got no fees at all for transaction accounts.
Although I didn't like them too much. Website and App are not that great and they spam me with paper mail much more aggressively than other banks do, trying to sell me "cheap" loans for "only" 14% p.a. and other annoying stuff like that.
PROTIP: There are often valid ways of meeting bonus criteria that are better than the one a company suggests in their advertising.
@MrTweek: Well sounds like NAB + ING are a good combo then.
I had a cc with NAB (a sign-up and cancel for velocity points, ozbargain style). They kept sending me paper statements and charging for them, even after I opted out several times.
Was very patronizing when they were telling me to switch to email statements even after I already had lol.
@TurkishDelight: yes, that's instant after the first time. But even to other banks. Noticeably faster to arrive and send than other banks I've dealt with.
nothing new with that .. basically a payment from any bank before about 3pm would always reach by BankWest account by about 8pm for the last 3-4 years. Same with ANZ.
I've transferred from CBA to ING and found it's quite quick. Have done it in the evening after 5pm and have had the money around 10am the next day.
Only drug dealers or businesses tax dodging need this
As a former drug dealer but now a business tax dodger I can confirm auspost cash deposits to ING are instant.
This ! You can apparently do it at the post office and it's "instant".
I used to be with ING until they started changing all their policies with regards to Super and found some things a bit painful on their online app for transfers / payments / bpay and scheduling.
Ended up going back to CBA - cash deposit 24/7 and coin deposit really useful and their app and cardless cash are useful.
You can deposit cash to your ING account at a post office.
Actually, into any bank, I think.
any bank really?
why would another bank help their competitor?
do you people not know what businesses do?
@tuzii: Yes, really, "me people" do know how business worky, me no idiut.
A post office is not a competitor to a bank.
https://auspost.com.au/money-insurance/financial-services/ba…
AMP Bank
ANZ
Australian Military Bank
Auswide Bank
Bank of Queensland
Bank of Sydney
Bank Australia
Bankwest
Bendigo Bank
Beyond Bank
Citibank
Commonwealth Bank of Australia
Defence Bank
G&C Mutual Bank
Heritage Bank
HSBC Bank Australia
ING DIRECT
ME Bank
MyState Bank Limited
National Australia Bank
P&N Bank
Police Bank
QBANK
QT Mutual Bank
Rabobank
Regional Australia Bank
Reliance Bank
Rural Bank
St.George Bank
Suncorp Bank
Teachers Mutual Bank
UniBank
Unity Bank
Victoria Teachers Mutual Bank
Westpac
Credit unions & others too, see the link for more info.
You deposit cash at Australia Post, so yes you're unable to do so outside of business hours.
I use ING as my main transaction account and have a no monthly fees nab account for when I need to deposit cash/cheques. It's a great combination.
INGs ATM fee refund is so good - it's saved me so much time and inconvenience over the years, love being able to use the rip off ATMs in pubs and servos.
Bank cheque is free.. I ordered 2 this year didn't pay anything.. There is some limit and conditions though..
that saving interest rate is way above ANZ's measly offer
and a useful travel insurance on their visa card, never book travel on a card without insurance!
Macquarie is better
does moving $1000 between the savings account and the transaction account work?
haven't tried but any normal bank would allow you more than balance transfer between the accounts, if its not going into someone else's account.
I guess there should not be a problem.
Thank you. I was referring to the need to deposit $1000 to get the 3% interest rate. From reading the terms and condition it needs to come from an external account.
@jtb: I have never tried this myself, but I'd keep a big4 account too, and send back/forth between this.
As other have said above, apparently NAB have no account keeping fees, and you get access to old-world tech (coin machines, cash/cheque deposits 24/7), etc
For international withdrawal - the overseas ATM may charge you a fee though and you wont know how much at time of withdrawal. I was slugged $10 for each withdrawal.
Was that $10 fee with ING?
https://www.ingdirect.com.au/rates-and-fees/orange-everyday-…
"International ATM withdrawal $2.50"
I've used this card in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan and various airports, only ever been charged an AU$2.50 fee.
Mates with other cards got slugged with fees ranging from AU$5 (macquarie) and AU$12 (big4)
When using the ATM, if it asks you which currency you want to take off the card, make sure you choose the local currency of the country, don't pick 'AUD' as the atm will give you a shittier rate than the Visa rate you get with ING, and you'll still pay the ATM fee.
I had used the card in NZ before and it was only $2.50 fee.
So when I went to Fiji I used the card there - was slugged with $2.50 ING Fee plus $10 fee from the bank that provided the ATM. I had done three withrdrawals so $37.50 of fees !!! Whilst the exchange rate was good on currency basis, with the fees it was pretty expensive.
ING said we clearly say in the documents that the other bank/institution may charge the fee !
yea it was the other bank that charged you. i withdrew all over europe and never paid more than $2.50 - germany - austria - switz - czech - uk
-> International ATM fee is only AU$2.50, no other fees associated with withdrawing cash, and you get the Visa cash rate.
https://www.ingdirect.com.au/rates-and-fees/orange-everyday-…
Nope - you get charged 2.5% for international transactions on top of the $2.50.
You're right on other points - which is why ING Direct for Australian transactions, and Citibank for International.
Also, if you're at the point where you're willing to change banks, you might want to research and switch your:
-> Energy/Gas companies (You can even just call your current company and threaten to leave, and they'll almost certainly give you a good offer. The customer retention teams have the most power to give you discounts).
-> Phone and Internet plans (you need to do this once every 12-24 months, as they are more than happy to leave you paying way too much).
-> Look into your private health cover if you have it, might be better rates around, and you might be covered for things you don't need at this point.
Have just done all those, hence why now the banks :)
When you changed companies, did you check the rates?
Everyone at work kept telling me to swap to Alinta since they have 32% off. So I dug deeper. Following are price comparisons in post code 5015 exc GST.
Origin's daily supply charge is 70.61c vs 89.24c with Alinta energy. After discounts that is origin 59.3124c vs alinta 60.6832c.
When comparing c/kWh, origins base rate/max rate is 31.32/35.24, with the max rate kicking in after 10.9859kw. Alinta's base rate is higher than origins. Alinta's rates also jump at roughly 3.3kw,7.7kw,16.4kw,27.4kw so if you have electric hot water, you're gonna be in the second or third price bracket just from that.
Even after discount, there aren't any real savings from Alinta unless your home is unoccupied for most days of a month and you turn off your electric hot water when you don't use it.
supply charges are on everyday you are CONNECTED not for every day you USE, so unoccupied would mean you would pay more as most discounts dont include the supply charges
@RockyRaccoon: I know that daily supply charge refers to everyday you are connected. I am referring to the discount on the c/kWh as it ends up cheaper for alinta post discount if you use less than 7kw per day.
That being said, I wasn't aware of discounts not being factored into daily supply charge, thank you for that info.
So I guess now the overall statement is that alinta is a lot more expensive.
And Origin isn't even the cheapest out there!
Great advice idonotknowwhy,
I need to look into my current accounts because I have a really strong feeling that I'm probably being taken for a ride on a few of my month-month accounts.
You don't need a single bank for all of your banking needs.
Many ppl I know in Australia just go with one (or 2 banks) at most.
Many of them even stick with their old Dollarmites account.
You should really have accounts with different banks (and use different ones for different purposes).
My advice is:
- ING for day-to-day (personally I use it to withdraw cash)
- ING for savings (ING Savings Maximiser is still one of the best rate in the market I think)
- Citibank Plus for overseas travel
- Any bank for Credit Card - choose the one that suits your usage
Out of the big 4, personally I only have accounts with NAB (no fees) but I hardly use them anyway.
Ditto..
Spot on…
And homeloan with whoever is best.
Citibank was one of the worst banks I've used, especially for overseas travel.
They blocked my CC the day I got back, didn't warn me about it (found out when I was shopping to refill the fridge after being gone for a few weeks), and when I called them they straight up accused me of fraud.
Their webapp is absolute rubbish as well, which definitely doesn't help.
Citibank credit isnt that great, but the advice for travel was about the Citbank Plus account which is a debit card
Probably Bankwest for the credit card, Platinum Zero is awesome.
At the moment I'm using ME Bank and ING. For ING pros, @idonotknowwhy is much spot on. But I'll add the $75 referral bonus ING runs from time to time as well. So you open an ING account for your self. When time comes, refer your wife and you both pocket $75/each.
Since you have a small CC debt, I wouldn't expect you to have a sizable saving so I don't think you'll need the ME Bank account.
+1 about the referrals, I currently have a $100 code, and I did refer my wife, and other friends and family :)
How long did it take to get the bonus? I've been with ING for almost a month now. I was referred and I referred another so I'm waiting for $200 in bonuses.
It depends on the conditions of your referral code.
Some of them require other things like 'make 5 transactions on the visa within 1 month', etc.
My credit came through within 2 weeks when I referred people. Same for the referees
I didn't get referred myself, I signed up based on research and didn't know anyone with referral codes :(
EDIT: Also, don't publish your code online (gumtree, etc). If ING see it, you won't get the credit and won't get the offers again.
@idonotknowwhy:
I'll probably give it another week or til the end of the month before I call them. My terms were
Orange Everyday Bonus Payment Offer (April) - The referrer and a friend can each receive $100 when the friend: Open OE and SM using promo code by 31 July 2017 and Deposits $1,000 or more within a calendar month from an external account (another bank) into their new Orange Everyday account by 31 July 2017. The offer commences on 11 April 2017 and is only available to those applicants who satisfy the current Eligibility Criteria by 31 July 2017.
Normally you get bonus the following month in the first or second week. I also have missed a few referalls, but most likely it is because the person did not satisfy all the criteria when they signed up. I am hoping so, anyway.
I received my $100 bonus on Friday even though I was expecting $400. They may come through at a later date, or I guess the person decided against the account/didn't sign up according to instructions.
ME bank are not good at managing TD's.
They never follow the maturity instructions.
Not sure about their other services.
I'm using ME bank for their HISA, currently at 3.05%/pa for balance up to 250k. ING used to be the same, but their HISA balance now is only 100k. So in between investments and transfer, we park our fund in ME Bank.
Completely agree with this, I had a term deposit with them for 12 months, called up to verify I did not want the TD turned over only to be told they never received the funds from me. What followed was a month of following up where they put my deposit and finally getting the funds back. Took another 2 weeks to receive the interest I would have earned. Never used them for a TD again.
time of term deposits are over. just use them for 3.05 % while tapping their plastic once a week
ING is definitely the way to go for everyday account. For travel, Citibank. And I also have NAB as a back up account and to use their coin counting machines etc, but otherwise rarely use it.
bankwest with a smart esaver account. and they have branches too ;)
How about a credit union? If you don't need any special/particular facilities from a big bank then try them. You probably won't feel any of the member returns or other supposed perks but it's nice to boycott the big 4.
I guess you could also go with a bitcoin wallet to boycott the big 4 :)
Closer to boycotting the AUD.
BTC can also do this for you ;)
I'm with Beyond Bank atm simply because of my home loan.
I'm pretty happy with them.
Over my lifetime I have been with Home, Challenge, NAB, Westpac, Bankwest, CBA (forced by employer), ANZ, ME and Beyond (that I can recall).
I choose my bank based on my needs.
Before I had a home loan I chose an account based on low fees and decent accessibility.
Once I had a home loan I chose based on best home loan.
Work out what you need from a bank - then go with whoever is doing the best deal on that.
Thinking Beyond for home loan as well. Are they good and any issues with them. They dont have ongoing fee, so seem good.
Do you mind sharing the rate you are paying for loan?
Like I said, I have had no problems with Beyond. They have a branch at Carousel which is pretty close to me, and they use NAB and Redi ATM network.
The worst bit was working out where all the NAB ATMs were.
My interest rate just went up. I think its now at 4% flat - but my offset pretty much matches my loan so I don't pay much.
Thanks. Their website says 3.83% and they are offering 3.84 to me. So not sure why they are increasing for existing customers.
I am really happy with NAB that I use for my pay etc. to go into, and no problem transferring funds to betting accounts (only used when I get special deals where I literally 'can't lose). Web site is really easy especially for transferring funds and paying bills, and they post statements. No atm fees at their atms.
But I transfer my money into Ubank and ING for their interest rates.
And to Citibank Plus for overseas, and foreign currency transactions.
Oh and TD with NAB 3 yrs 3.15% (I don't know if still available) They send me a monthly advice.
To be honest, if it's a Household Account and Work Account, I wouldn't be bothered switching banks if you're not paying fees and don't have a home loan.
With your credit card, I'll shop around and get a 2nd or 3rd card to meet my needs, i.e. no international transaction fees.
If coming from the CBA be aware of the shock of not having ATM readily available (without paying for a fee).
All in all, switching everyday bank account isn't worth the hassles for your needs.
With ING, you can use ANY ATM in the country, without paying the fee.
I find it annoying if I'm out with mates and they have too find/wait for specific ATMs, or cross the road, to save on the fees lol.
But yeah, if you have no fees, no need to 'switch' banks, just open an ING account AND keep your current bank.
But what about depositing cheques?
Just too hard for little benefits.
If the OP Was with a smaller bank with few ATMs, then fine, but CBA ATMs are everywhere, including 7 Eleven which is handy.
Yeah, but those 'bankwest' atms which are free for CBA users in 7/11, don't do deposits anyway.
In which case, you can use ING there just as well as CBA and Bankwest.
And yeah, I don't use cheques anymore.
I also prefer not to receive cheques, but many companies and Gov organisations still issue cheques.
@JB1: That's a shame :(
The last cheque I recieved was from Metro, when there was an issue with my "Metcard" and I had to fill out the form to get like $4.05 back lol
Who still gets cheques? I haven't even seen a cheque for about 3 years.
Last one I got was from the council, overcharged council rates.
Interestingly, I deposited it at a ATM inside a CBA branch, you don't have to enter in the value of the cheque, the machine detects it for you and the receipt also prints a copy of the cheque.
No ATM fee even at like Crown Casino ATMs?
Correct!
The fee will be charged (so the balance must be available), but you'll get the fee refunded immediately.
Which Bank? - dare I say Commonwealth is the right answer
they changed their name twice: shut most branches and became the "where bank" lol
now they call themselves can it means Narev can rip you off!
Luv my mebank, good for a quarter mio. Ing is limited to 100k else they look gr8 for the moment. The other Dutch joker Rabo has a 4 mo 3.05 deal but is it worth the hassle?
You can open multiple 'savings maximizer' accounts within the same ING account, and spread your cash accross these*
*I'd never put more than about 220k in one bank anyway, as the federal government guarantee is only up to 250k per bank.
I recently moved from CBA to Macquarie, I'm super happy with the move - transfers are quick and no ATM fees are a major plus too. I opened up a NAB account as well (no fee) just to use their ATM's for deposits.
I love the Macquarie netbank interface and Android app.
I used this while overseas for all my purchases where MC was accepted, and loved getting the android notification about the purchase instantly.
Mac bank transaction platinum and saving + nab no fee acct
Cba
Agreed with most of the comments above, ING for savings, Citibank for travel.
ING Direct
Why?
-> No account fees
-> No ATM fees in Australia, even at pubs! (They refund the fee immediately) *
-> International ATM fee is only AU$2.50, no other fees associated with withdrawing cash, and you get the Visa cash rate.
-> Excellent Android app with Android pay support.
-> Always a good rate on savings (3% right now).
-> I've noticed other rare things are cheap, like sending a 'bank cheque' would have cost me $30 at CBA, but was only $10 with ING.
*Only catch for free ATM usage is you need to deposit $1000 into your account every month. This can be as simple as sending $1000 in on the 1st, sending it back out on the 2nd. I simply deposit my pay in there.
Cons vs big banks:
No branches, so no amenities like coin counting, etc.