Capital One Interest Online Checking

Capital One Bank is now offering a new checking account product called Interest Online Checking. The current rate is 1.10%.  And this is not a tiered rate, meaning you will earn 1.10% on your balance regardless of what it is.

Some features of the online account are:

• No fees or minimum balance requirements
• First order of paper checks is free
• Free Online bill pay and online banking
• Free MasterCard Debit Card to access your funds
• Your ATM Fees will be reimbursed up to $10 each month
• ACH Transfer between you Capital One Checking and your existing bank

It appears that this account is available in areas that do not have physical branches. Their branches are mainly located in New York and Texas, so it is safe to assume that it should be available in most areas. It asks you for a zip code prior to allowing you to open the account, so you will know for sure right away.

Once you add in the $10 ATM reimbursement and a non-tiered interest rate, this account seems pretty competitive with the likes of Ally Bank and ING Direct’s checking account products. It also is nice that they offer paper checks. ING Direct’s electric orange checking does not allow for paper checks, so if actually having a checkbook is important to you, then you may consider opening an account here.

There is no capital one promo code for this account, but with all the features and it being a completely free account that earns interest, I think the account pretty much speaks for itself.

Checkout Capital One’s Interest Online Checking page for more details and to appy.

Bing Cash Back is Ending!

For those of you that have been using Bing Cash back, a sad day is upon us. While I was logging into my account, I noticed a little message that said the following: “As of July 30th, 2010 9:00 p.m. PT, we will no longer be offering the cashback program”. According to their Community Site it says that “did not see the broad adoption that we had hoped for”.

This is said in the fact that Bing Cashback had the highest percentages of cash back than any other cashback site. And at times they would do an unadvertised promo like when they did the 20% cashback at Walmart.com last Christmas, or the current 20% cashback at Drugstore.com.

Yes I will admit I was a late adopter of Bing Cash back and was starting to finally get into it. All in all, it wasn’t a total loss. I received just under $200 cash back since I started using the site last December, but I was hoping for a lot more.

I guess it is time to move on and back to the likes of Ebates, Mr Rebates and Big Crumbs. It will be hard to miss that 20% back, that is for sure.

Ally Bank – Raise Your Rate CD

Here is an interesting new product being offered from Ally Bank. It is called the Raise Your Rate CD. Basically it works the same as a CD, but the twist is that it allows you to raise the rate once during the term of the CD rather then being locked into the interest rate as with a regular CD.

This is very nice since if rates start going up, which most likely they will be in the next few months, you have the opportunity to increase your CD to that rate. Currently the Raise Your Rate CD is being offered at 1.99% for a 2 year term. If rates start increase, just give them a call and have your CD set to that new rate.

The Raise Your Rate CD also comes with Ally’s 10 day best rate guarantee which means when you open the CD and the rate increases in the first 10 days of the CD period, you will receive that increased rate. This does not count toward your one time CD rate increase.

Another nice feature of Ally Bank CD’s is that they will automatically renew when the term is up if you don’t call them ahead of time to cancel the renewal. When the CD does automatically renew it will do so at the current rate for that CD, so if you plan on just letting your money roll then there is nothing you need to do to receive the most recent rate.

This is a great deal considering that the 2 year rate is pretty competitive and with the option to increase that rate of the 2 year term it is hard to find a better place to hold your money. Ally Bank, formerly known as GMAC Bank, is FDIC Insured and has been around for many years. It also has a history of having very competitive rates along with no hidden fees in their products.

More details on the Raise Your Rate CD.

Discover Bank High Yield Savings

One account that tends to go unnoticed these days is the High Yield Savings Account from Discover Bank. The yield, currently 1.35% is higher than that of INGDirect’s Orange Savings and Ally Bank’s High Yield Savings account. To receive that high rate, you need a minimum balance of $500 in the account.

Discover Bank is the same institution that issues the Discover credit card, so they have been around for a while. In addition, they are FDIC insured up to $250,000 per account.

One interesting thing about Discover Bank is that you rarely see advertisements like the other banks. I am not quite sure why with such a high rate you think that they would steal away the competition. The High Yield Savings Account also has been been the Bankrate.com Top Tier Winner for consistently high yields.

There is an ETF feature that lets you move money in and out of the account to a linked checking account that you set up. There is also live 24/7 customer service in case you need to call them for any reason.

If you are looking for a safe bank with a high rate and great customer service, you should take a look at the High Yield Savings Account from Discover Bank.

Another Woot Off Going On Now

Woot.com is having another of its Woot Offs right now. It started around midnight central time and will go until they run out of stuff. If you are unfamiliar with Woot.com, they are a site that offers items at a discount. Usually only one item is listed per day starting at 12am Central Time and is listed until it is sold out or 11:59PM Central Time.

A Woot Off, which happens rarely, is a number of products that are for sale on a particular day or successive days. One product follows another as soon as it has been sold out. The number of Woot-Off items, sequence, and quantity will not be announced so an item could take a while to sell out or sell out immediately. Don’t miss a chance to score some items at a steal if you have some money to blow! But remember, that I prefer you really think about saving it.

Hooked on Cheap Costco Gas

Has anyone noticed that Costco gas prices still seem to be lower then most everywhere else? Well maybe it is only in my area, but their gas prices are around $.15 less than the other big franchises and about $.07 less then Sam’s Club. I have now conditioned the wife that she is no longer allowed to buy gas anywhere else!

You say that a $.10 difference doesn’t mean anything? Well say your car takes 20 gallons. That is a $2.00 difference and carry that over 10 fillups, that is a $20 savings. Add in the 3% savings you get when using the Costco American Express Card ($25 Bonus when signing up) and you can really see the money you save add up.

It’s funny, we have had a Costco card for a few years now, and we really only shop there for things like paper towel and toilet paper since they are things we can buy in bulk that can last forever. The lion share of the Costco Amex Card use is for the gas.

I still get a lot of crap from people telling me that cheap gas at places like Costco can ruin your engine. Well let me say that if that was the case there wouldn’t be a line of 40 cars there everytime I go to fill up. Remeber that there are only a select number of refineries out there. All the gas comes from one of them and certain companies add things like additives and detergents which they say helps your engine, but also increases the price.

Right now gas purchases are one of our biggest expenses in my household so anything we can do to lower it is huge for us and right now Costco helps us with that!

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