If you're one of the lucky people who have $10,000 or more to deposit in a liquid savings account, Capital One is offering a $50 bonus for opening an account plus an extra 10% quarterly bonus on all interest earned.
The Capital One InterestPlus Online Savings account has long offered one of the best interest rates around for Internet banking. Now, they're offering another bonus for customers who are able to deposit and maintain high balance limits. If you open a Capital One InterestPlus account using the offer code FUND218DF and have a balance of $10,000 or more on May 2, 2011, you will receive a $50 bonus. Your account must remain open 4 - 8 weeks after May 2, during which time your bonus will be credited to your account. If you maintain a $10,000 or more average monthly balance in your savings account, every quarter you will get an additional 10% bonus on the interest earned for that quarter.
Don't have $10,000 to deposit? Unfortunately, that means that you are ineligible for the $50 bonus deal. However, you can still get the 10% quarterly bonus if you have and use your Capital One credit card once month. Additionally, you only need to have an account balance of $1,000 or more to qualify for the high 1.10% APY. Balances less than $1,000 will earn 0.10% APY. It's just one more incentive to build up your savings.
If you use bill pay often, Citizens Bank will pay new checking customers $40 a month for each month you make at least 5 bill pay transactions of $50 or more. The offer is good for up to 6 months, so you can get paid up to $240. Additionally, if you open a Green Checking account, you can earn even more money in bonuses.
It's always nice when you can get your checking account to give you some money back, especially when it's to the tune of a couple hundred dollars. If you open your first Citizens Bank checking account between April 9, 2011 and May 6, 2011, you can earn up to $240 over six months by using online bill payment. Each month, if you make at least five bill pay transactions at $50 or more, you'll get a bonus of $40 for that month. This bonus offer is good for the first six months of your checking account, so you can earn up to $240.
Since there are multiple banks doing business under the Citizens Bank name, this offer relates only to the bank owned by Royal Bank of Scotland and doing business in Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Vermont.
While Citizens Bank doesn't offer any condition-less free checking accounts, there are still ways that you can get the monthly service fee waived. If you opt for their Green Checking account, the $4.99 monthly service fee is waived if you make five bill pay transactions each month. Since you'll be making the five bill pay transactions each month anyway to get the $40 bonus, just keep up the bill pay transactions and the checking account will remain free. Alternately, if you maintain an average balance of $1,500, the monthly service fee for the Green Checking account will also be waived. The Green Checking comes with one additional bonus: it offers Green$ense.
With Green$ense, every time you pay without paper (like using a debit card or using online bill pay), you will earn a 10-cent bonus on each transaction you make and you can earn up to $120 per year in Green$ense bonuses. For this account, you will automatically be enrolled in paperless statements and online bill pay, and you will receive a debit card made from recycled plastic. You must have at least 10 eligible transactions in a month to receive a Green$ense earnings credit for that month. If you have at least 10 eligible transactions in a month, you will receive 10 cents for each eligible transaction up to a maximum of 100 eligible transactions in the month ($10 monthly cap).
If you have only $500 to invest for the long term, Astoria Federal Savings offers 2.65% APY for a five-year CD. Additionally, you can withdrawal your credited interest without penalty, if needed.
In this economy, it's hard to think about saving a lot of money long-term. However, even just putting a little bit away is better than nothing at all. As we all know, it's extremely difficult to find good interest rates in today's market, but Astoria Federal Savings is offering a five-year CD with very competitive 2.65% APY. This CD only requires a $500 minimum deposit, so even if you only have $500 to invest, the CD will offer you the peace of mind that your small investment is safe, secure, and earning you one of the best interest rates available in the market. Interest is compounded daily, credited quarterly and also at maturity.
One of the disadvantages of CDs is that your money is tied up and you cannot access your deposit without penalties until the CD matures. Although the Astoria Federal Savings CD also does not allow you to withdraw your initial deposit without penalty, it does give you a different option: you are able to withdrawal your credited interest, without any penalty at all. Of course, you won’t have the same liquidity that you would have with a money market account, by any means, but it's nice to have the option to at least withdrawal be interested, if needed.
Astoria Federal has 85 banking offices throughout Brooklyn, Queens, Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester counties.
