ING Direct Lowering Interest Rate
September 19, 2007

It was bound to happen, ING's begun lowering their interest rate from 4.5% to 4.3%. That's still worlds better than a brick'n'mortar especially when combined with how kick-ass their other services are. I'll stick with them, for sure, but it's a sign of the times.

Do you remember opening a bank account as a kid and being amazed at the powers of compounding interest? Do you think that parents still do that with their kids today?

ING Actually Mentioned in College!
September 18, 2007

Something rather amazing happened yesterday while at school. One of my professors actually demonstrated a bit of real world knowledge! The professor was discussing the inanity of government taxation on ordinary savings accounts and actually dropped some props to ING! Working everything out, your typical brick'n'mortar bank yields around 0.001% monthly interest on your savings - meanwhile (I believe, it's been awhile since I ran the numbers) ING actually offers you 0.01% monthly interest - meaning that you actually accrue a meaningful amount of money from saving for Uncle Sam to tax as compared to the tenths of pennies that he tries to dig out ordinarily.

Anyway, I'm still continuing to love my ING Electric Orange checking account in addition to the kick-ass savings account that I've got. I can't believe how much money I've lost over the years by not choosing a good banking institution. Goooo meaningful interest!

First Round of Bills with ING Electric Orange
August 03, 2007

ING Electric Orange is the great new checking service from ING that provides you a kick-ass checking account with great interest and introductory cash-back. The catch? No paper checks. Well, here in America that makes life a little difficult since very few businesses accept (in a rational way) credit-card based payments for monthly bills. So, what's a boy to do? Well, the ING Electric Orange account takes care of you by allowing you to order pre-written checks and have them mailed out to you.

I've written about my Electric Orange account before, but now our first round of bills at the house are rolling in. The process of ordering pre-written checks has been pretty good so far. The checks take roughly three days from date of ordering to arrive at your house (or to the business) and then you can do what you need to with them after that. There's two downsides to this approach. The first is that the money is immediately withdrawn from your account, even before the check is sent. This can be an annoyance when you have a recipient who takes their time when cashing a check (*ahem* Me *ahem*).

The other problem is that the check is mailed addressed to the recipient of the check. So, if you have strict mail-people or a forward setup you will have issues getting your check. Specifically, we had our rent check mailed to us (and addressed to The Manager) but it ended up being forwarded to The Manager without any notice to us. That freaked us out a good bit, but we got everything settled.

So, is it worth the hassle? I think so. For the price of having to think ahead and sort out the mail forwarding thing, I get to earn a decent amount of interest and cash back. How much? For somewhere around $1000 of spending and a pretty consistent $200 balance, I've gotten back $19 in interest and cash-back rewards (real cash, not stupid gift certificates). I also get great integration with my ING Savings account which allows me to easily transfer money back and forth at the drop of a hat.

So, thanks ING! You've made saving worth it again.

ING Electric Orange Checking Rocks
July 16, 2007

A few months ago I took the plunge. I'd already been using ING's savings account offerings and was highly pleased. Their interest rates were rocking and their simple interface was a breath of fresh air. "What the hell?", I thought, "Even if I don't like it, I can just cancel it.". Well, I'm incredibly glad that I did it.

ING's Electric Orange checking account is much like its savings account, it blows brick'n'mortar banks out of the water. It's a no-fee no-minimum balance account that earns around 4% interest with a 1% cash-back bonus on signature based purchases for a few months after opening an account. My favorite part of the service, though, is their user interface. It's clean, fast and easy to use. I especially like that there is a running balance after each transaction which makes tracking down that missed entry in your register that much easier.

There's two catches to the account, which may turn some of you off. The first is that getting money into the account can be tricky and the second is that there are no blank checks.

The first problem boils down to the fact that there's only three ways to get money into your account, and not one of them is walking up to a teller at ING (since there aren't any!). Your options are to mail the check in (unsigned), transfer money from a linked account or use direct deposit. For me this means maintaining my Wells Fargo account for depositing my paychecks and then transferring the money into my ING Savings account. Its not a bad setup, but some of you with financial troubles (and nothing in the way of savings) may get hurt by this couple-day process.

The second problem is that there are no blank checks. That is, in order to pay somebody by check (say, you're landlord) you must order the check pre-written from ING. This can be annoying for paying Michelle back for lunch yesterday, but it can also be good for recurring bill charges (say, you're landlord). Why's that? ING allows you to schedule mailing of the check. You can have ING mail you your rent check on the 21st of every month and you'll never forget it again! Heck, for apartment dwellers that means you can probably just move the check from your mailbox to the rent-deposit box without even taking a step!

Anyway, I just wanted to sing the praises of this beautiful little account. It's made a very nice addition to my arsenal of financial weapons. I just love how ING has helped me to start saving more than ever. Maybe Emily and I will finally be able to buy a house soon!

ING Updates
February 17, 2007

So, I've been with ING almost two months now and I wanted to give an update. They're simply phenomenal. For the last five years I've /wasted/ so much money by leaving it in a traditional bank that it's amazing. The 4.5%APR beats the pants off of any brick'n'mortar that will give me an ambiguous 0.04% something rate. On $3,000 (which is what I had in there at one time) in Wells Fargo I'm lucky to earn more than 51c in a month with their second-to-best plan. Of course, I can lose that in a heart-beat if I (for instance) have to draw tuition money and go below $2,000 in that account in order to incur.... CHARGES-ARGES-ARGES-arges.

ING's transfers are painless and usually take less than one week to complete. Then, the money's happily sitting in its new home actually accruing interest to combat inflation. So, joyous day - ING has gotten me happily saving!

Taking the Plunge, ING Direct
January 05, 2007

Well, I was talking with one of my co-workers today and she made mention of her ING Direct savings account. I have a number of finance and accounting blogs in my RSS feed and I've been hearing a lot of good things about them. I decided today that I'm closing up my TCF account (my real money is elsewhere, I don't use TCF) and signing up with ING. I'm currently getting a 4.50% APY which is far better than the paltry 0.04% that I'm getting through my current bank.

Well, if you're interested in an ING account yourself - keep an eye out here. I'll be posting updates on my experiences with them.