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I have this account, started a few months ago. Only drawback I've found is that if/when they increase the interest rate on their accounts, you have to manually request an increase each time. I started at 5.03%, now requested an increase to 5.25%. I messaged them in the app at 4:53pm, they responded and updated my rate at 5:03pm (exactly 10 min). I'm ok doing a couple minutes worth of work a couple/few times a year to maintain the highest percentage. Works exactly as promised otherwise, great rates.
As per their website FAQ...
The dollar limits at funding are:
Maximum to transfer in: $250,000.00
The dollar limits after your account is funded are:
Maximum per day in or out $30,000.00
Maximum per month $60,000.00
You may not make funds transfers in excess of limits described on the External Bank Transfer service.
We reserve the right to change from time to time the dollar amount of funds transfers you are permitted to make using our service.
I had the same experience today. Happened to check my account and found that my 5.09% rate had been downgraded to 4.5%. I spoke to CS on the phone and they raised my rate to 5.25%. I asked what the deal was with lowering my interest rate when rates are rising -- including the rates they offer new customers. He said that I just have to check my account every week or so to see if they do it again!
So basically, this is a great account for folks willing to call them on their BS. Apparently enough customers don't do that to make it worthwhile for them to play games like this.
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I've been using CIT bank, which is currently offering 5.05% apy. I've seen a couple banks offering 5.5% recently. Thinking about making a switch but it's such a pain. Love my $1,000 per month interest though.
UFB Direct is (IMHO) an extremely scammy operation and you will be frustrated if you sign up with them. Nerd Wallet, while rating them 4.5/5.0 for their rates, has cited various customer service issues. Notably their frequent sidelining of your account and lowering the interest rate as a result. Here is Nerd Wallet's summary:
[We are aware of] reader complaints on three issues. Since late October 2022, NerdWallet readers have described delays in getting issues resolved through customer support, unusually long transfer times for funding accounts, as well as a lack of information about how to benefit from ongoing interest rate increases. (These complaints and issues don't factor into UFB Direct's star ratings given the variability associated with customer experiences; see our methodology.)
1. Customer support delays: "With the significant spike in new customer acquisition combined with historically low unemployment rates, we experienced some challenges with longer wait times than average," Elise Yung, former senior vice president of consumer deposits at UFB Direct's parent institution, Axos Bank, said in a February 2023 email. As a result, the servicing team has been tripled and the bank continues to find additional ways to optimize, she said. Yung recommends that customers chat with a UFB Direct chatbot or contact support outside regular business hours.
2. Long transfer waits: "With the significant spike in identity theft, we need time to confirm the validity of any money movement before releasing it. We are indeed working on a plan for faster release," Yung said in the February email.
3. Confusion over multiple account "upgrades": UFB Direct relaunched its savings and money market accounts seven [MAKE THAT EIGHT] times from August 2022 to July 2023, and customers of existing accounts must [monitor account changes themselves and then] request to upgrade to the latest account to benefit from ongoing interest rate changes [otherwise, their accounts are relegated to a legacy status at a lower interest rate]. The bank said it has processed all requests to upgrade.
If you're unsure what account you have, log into UFB's site or app and compare it with the current account name. Here's a rough timeline of accounts:
Aug. 9 - Sept. 20, 2022: UFB Rewards Savings and UFB Rewards Money Market.
Nov. 8 - Dec. 13, 2022: UFB High Rate Savings and UFB High Rate Money Market.
Dec. 14, 2022 - Feb. 21, 2023: UFB Best Savings and UFB Best Money Market.
Feb. 22 - April 12, 2023: UFB Preferred Savings and UFB Preferred Money Market.
April 13 - July 18, 2023: UFB Premier Savings and UFB Premier Money Market.
July 19, 2023: UFB Priority Savings and UFB Priority Money Market.
[Fall 2023 UFB Secure Savings and UFB Secure Money Market]
"The unusual frequency of product launches is tied to the unusual frequency" of the Fed rate changes, Yung said in an April 2023 email.
Lots of BS from Mr. Yung, and the frequent account changes will likely cease if/when rates start to drop, but there are other good choices that are not so scammy (examples: CIT Bank, Bask Bank)
Just stumbled upon this and after rummaging thru different potential accounts I finally settled on UFB. These are my opinions after 3 months.
-They have an app and you get a fugasi looking "debit" card. So if you need to "feel" like you have connection to your money, it's sorta there.
-I'm at 5.25%. If they raise rates, you will NOT be automatically bumped up. You need to use the chat feature and apparently a quick message and your acct will be bumped up. I'm thinking maybe this is why people are saying their rate got lowered??? Maybe they just seen the current promos at 5.25 and they had signed up for 5.05 and thought they were lowered. Just a thought…
-I have not had them lower my rate. I open the app and check from time to time.
-The messaging isn't the best. Little slow but they get the job done that you need. It's definitely a low budget operation, which most of these high yield accts are. I wasn't expecting the greatest customer care going in.
If you're ok with losing 1% from the highest yield, AMEX Savings is probably your #1 best best. I have that as well and it's a dream if you LOVE/NEED good customer service.
Why bother having to babysit a savings account to get the extra .05% interest when you can just use another bank? Save yourself the time of dealing with their nonsense.
Hello, what reputable bank do you recommend that offers this kind of interest rate. Thanks in advance!
fwiw, just received an offer from Fifth Third for 5.3% APY on savings account good until June of 2024. *Need $25K minimum balance. Since I already have an account there, I'm going to take that offer and move money into that account until 6/24.
I have this account, started a few months ago. Only drawback I've found is that if/when they increase the interest rate on their accounts, you have to manually request an increase each time. I started at 5.03%, now requested an increase to 5.25%. I messaged them in the app at 4:53pm, they responded and updated my rate at 5:03pm (exactly 10 min). I'm ok doing a couple minutes worth of work a couple/few times a year to maintain the highest percentage. Works exactly as promised otherwise, great rates.
Yeah I got fed up with them. I saw new rates, assumed I would get them, found out they tweaked the name of the account and I would have to set up a new one. No thanks. They are banking on people not watching. Just buy short term bonds or CDs they are 5.5% anyway.
I love the app and my interest is paid on time and I have no issues transferring money out of the bank as well as using them as a hub to transfer money between banks keeping UFB as the middle man
HERE IS MY ISSUE: I can't stand how often they open up new products and never disclose that your account is being reduced to a lower rate but that you can rollover to a premium rate.
I find that practice to be deceptive when practiced consistently which is basically more than once every 18 months
Just my experience, YMMV, but I have had an account for 10 months and have made several thousand dollars in interest. Thus far, I have not had my rate lowered, and when I see the rate go up, I chat with a rep online and it's raised in 10 minutes or less (done it a few times since inception).
My rate started at 4.85, now at 5.25. Transfers in take a week for me. I have not moved money out yet, so no experience with that.
If you are here, you are a Slickdealer. Don't want to miss a rate update? Set up a Slickdeal alert for Axos/UFB and when you get a deal notification, log on to UFB and ask for the rate update.
Just stumbled upon this and after rummaging thru different potential accounts I finally settled on UFB. These are my opinions after 3 months.
-They have an app and you get a fugasi looking "debit" card. So if you need to "feel" like you have connection to your money, it's sorta there.
-I'm at 5.25%. If they raise rates, you will NOT be automatically bumped up. You need to use the chat feature and apparently a quick message and your acct will be bumped up. I'm thinking maybe this is why people are saying their rate got lowered??? Maybe they just seen the current promos at 5.25 and they had signed up for 5.05 and thought they were lowered. Just a thought…
-I have not had them lower my rate. I open the app and check from time to time.
-The messaging isn't the best. Little slow but they get the job done that you need. It's definitely a low budget operation, which most of these high yield accts are. I wasn't expecting the greatest customer care going in.
If you're ok with losing 1% from the highest yield, AMEX Savings is probably your #1 best best. I have that as well and it's a dream if you LOVE/NEED good customer service.
I can assure you that I was at 5% when I signed up, which was far better than the 4.2 I had with SoFi and the 4.25 or so I was at with BMO Harris. So I had moved a majority of my funds to UFB. After about 3 months I checked my app and noticed my rate had dropped to 4.5%. I called and spoke to someone and she quickly moved me to the new 5.25% account type. So at least some people are correct when saying their rate dropped, I know for a fact mine did with no notice to me. That's what I noticed in their fine print is specifically says they can change the rate without any notification.
Just FYI to anyone trying this for the first time, the app is not great and kept asking me to "make my initial deposit". I ended up doing it 3-4 times because it never said transaction successfully made wait x amount of hours for it to post or something along those lines and when I opened the app it kept asking me "make your initial deposit" so I ended up over drawing my checking account by like 80k after all 4 of the transactions eventually posted. Seeing my checking account in the negative was startling to say the least. Their customer service was useless to remedy this. Apple savings account app, chase app are much better fwiw
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The dollar limits at funding are:
Maximum to transfer in: $250,000.00
The dollar limits after your account is funded are:
Maximum per day in or out $30,000.00
Maximum per month $60,000.00
You may not make funds transfers in excess of limits described on the External Bank Transfer service.
We reserve the right to change from time to time the dollar amount of funds transfers you are permitted to make using our service.
https://www.ufbdirect.c
So basically, this is a great account for folks willing to call them on their BS. Apparently enough customers don't do that to make it worthwhile for them to play games like this.
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I'd like to know also
[We are aware of] reader complaints on three issues. Since late October 2022, NerdWallet readers have described delays in getting issues resolved through customer support, unusually long transfer times for funding accounts, as well as a lack of information about how to benefit from ongoing interest rate increases. (These complaints and issues don't factor into UFB Direct's star ratings given the variability associated with customer experiences; see our methodology.)
1. Customer support delays: "With the significant spike in new customer acquisition combined with historically low unemployment rates, we experienced some challenges with longer wait times than average," Elise Yung, former senior vice president of consumer deposits at UFB Direct's parent institution, Axos Bank, said in a February 2023 email. As a result, the servicing team has been tripled and the bank continues to find additional ways to optimize, she said. Yung recommends that customers chat with a UFB Direct chatbot or contact support outside regular business hours.
2. Long transfer waits: "With the significant spike in identity theft, we need time to confirm the validity of any money movement before releasing it. We are indeed working on a plan for faster release," Yung said in the February email.
3. Confusion over multiple account "upgrades": UFB Direct relaunched its savings and money market accounts seven [MAKE THAT EIGHT] times from August 2022 to July 2023, and customers of existing accounts must [monitor account changes themselves and then] request to upgrade to the latest account to benefit from ongoing interest rate changes [otherwise, their accounts are relegated to a legacy status at a lower interest rate]. The bank said it has processed all requests to upgrade.
If you're unsure what account you have, log into UFB's site or app and compare it with the current account name. Here's a rough timeline of accounts:
Aug. 9 - Sept. 20, 2022: UFB Rewards Savings and UFB Rewards Money Market.
Sept. 21 - Nov. 7, 2022: UFB Elite Savings and UFB Elite Money Market.
Nov. 8 - Dec. 13, 2022: UFB High Rate Savings and UFB High Rate Money Market.
Dec. 14, 2022 - Feb. 21, 2023: UFB Best Savings and UFB Best Money Market.
Feb. 22 - April 12, 2023: UFB Preferred Savings and UFB Preferred Money Market.
April 13 - July 18, 2023: UFB Premier Savings and UFB Premier Money Market.
July 19, 2023: UFB Priority Savings and UFB Priority Money Market.
[Fall 2023 UFB Secure Savings and UFB Secure Money Market]
"The unusual frequency of product launches is tied to the unusual frequency" of the Fed rate changes, Yung said in an April 2023 email.
Lots of BS from Mr. Yung, and the frequent account changes will likely cease if/when rates start to drop, but there are other good choices that are not so scammy (examples: CIT Bank, Bask Bank)
-They have an app and you get a fugasi looking "debit" card. So if you need to "feel" like you have connection to your money, it's sorta there.
-I'm at 5.25%. If they raise rates, you will NOT be automatically bumped up. You need to use the chat feature and apparently a quick message and your acct will be bumped up. I'm thinking maybe this is why people are saying their rate got lowered??? Maybe they just seen the current promos at 5.25 and they had signed up for 5.05 and thought they were lowered. Just a thought…
-I have not had them lower my rate. I open the app and check from time to time.
-The messaging isn't the best. Little slow but they get the job done that you need. It's definitely a low budget operation, which most of these high yield accts are. I wasn't expecting the greatest customer care going in.
If you're ok with losing 1% from the highest yield, AMEX Savings is probably your #1 best best. I have that as well and it's a dream if you LOVE/NEED good customer service.
Doing the same. What is the maturity you pick for t bills?
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screw these guys
4 or 8 weeks, since I want to stay liquid
HERE IS MY ISSUE: I can't stand how often they open up new products and never disclose that your account is being reduced to a lower rate but that you can rollover to a premium rate.
I find that practice to be deceptive when practiced consistently which is basically more than once every 18 months
My rate started at 4.85, now at 5.25. Transfers in take a week for me. I have not moved money out yet, so no experience with that.
If you are here, you are a Slickdealer. Don't want to miss a rate update? Set up a Slickdeal alert for Axos/UFB and when you get a deal notification, log on to UFB and ask for the rate update.
Damn if ur house down payment is 250k good for you
-They have an app and you get a fugasi looking "debit" card. So if you need to "feel" like you have connection to your money, it's sorta there.
-I'm at 5.25%. If they raise rates, you will NOT be automatically bumped up. You need to use the chat feature and apparently a quick message and your acct will be bumped up. I'm thinking maybe this is why people are saying their rate got lowered??? Maybe they just seen the current promos at 5.25 and they had signed up for 5.05 and thought they were lowered. Just a thought…
-I have not had them lower my rate. I open the app and check from time to time.
-The messaging isn't the best. Little slow but they get the job done that you need. It's definitely a low budget operation, which most of these high yield accts are. I wasn't expecting the greatest customer care going in.
If you're ok with losing 1% from the highest yield, AMEX Savings is probably your #1 best best. I have that as well and it's a dream if you LOVE/NEED good customer service.
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.