Okay, so I probably shouldn't be sharing this — but here we are. If you're with ING, you'll know the drill: to earn that sweet bonus interest and avoid fees, you need to:
Make five card transactions per month,
Deposit at least $1,000 from an external account, and
Grow your balance each month (for the Savings Maximiser bonus rate).
Now, I used to automate all of this, but after moving things around and temp relocating overseas, I’ve streamlined it into a five-minute monthly ritual that hits all the requirements — with minimal effort.
💸 Step 1: Faking the External Deposit
Transfer $1,000 out of your ING Orange Everyday (OE) to an external account (e.g., Westpac).
Wait a few minutes (thanks Osko!), then transfer the $1,000 back in to ING.
✅ ING sees it as a valid external deposit. No one’s the wiser.
🛍️ Step 2: Quick Card Transactions (Even If You're Overseas)
I’m currently based overseas , and while I use the card normally I have other cards for other things (cashback cards where i am) , so I mainly use ING for high interest plus international transactions with no fees sometimes I fall short of the required five transactions. So here’s the trick:
Near the end of the month, I check how many card transactions I’ve made.
If I need more, I go to Aussie retailers like Bunnings online.
I buy small items (e.g., washers for 17 cents) via click & collect…….. when you don't collect, they will refund a week later
Each checkout = one transaction. Do as many as you need.
Because they’re Australian merchants, they settle fast and count for ING’s purposes — even from overseas.
📈 Step 3: Faking the Balance Growth (The Underrated Hack)
Yes — ING requires your Savings Maximiser balance to grow each month to get bonus interest. To make sure this box is ticked, I’ve set up an automatic payment of $0.10 from OE to Savings Maximiser each month.
✅ Technically, your balance has grown. That’s all ING cares about.
🧠 Step 4: The Advanced Maximiser-to-Maximiser Shuffle
(Full disclosure: I didn’t figure this one out until I was overseas — and I can’t set it up properly until I’m back in Australia.)
If you really want to game the balance growth rule, here’s how:
Open a second Savings Maximiser.
On the 1st of the month, withdraw whatever money you’ll need for the month from Maximiser 1 and move it into your Orange Everyday.
Transfer everything remaining in Maximiser 1 into Maximiser 2.
So now:
Your balance in Maximiser 1 has technically increased (since it started near zero),
Your money is still earning interest in Maximiser 2,
And you’ve kept full bonus eligibility without actually growing your total savings.
I haven’t been able to test this fully while overseas, but in theory, doing this once at the start of each month should keep ING’s system happy.
⚠️ Final Thoughts
Yes — this all takes about five minutes a month.
Yes — it requires keeping some cash spread across multiple accounts.
But if you're organised (or just stubborn like me), it’s a neat little system to keep your interest flowing while barely lifting a finger.
This will work with many banks, but not ING for a long period of time. They have been proactive about closing accounts ever since the 5% cashback days.
People have reported in the past that they simply close accounts that to the absolute minimum to be eligible. ING have closed accounts for less then what you are doing.