HSBCDirect 6.00% APY New Money Offer

As I previously discussed, I have had my emergency fund and savings at ING Direct even though I knew that I was losing money by not switching to HSBCDirect or EmigrantDirect.

6.00% APY
Well, this afternoon I was balancing my checkbook and reviewing my various online accounts. Part of that process is that I check the current offers for competing banks and I noticed that HSBCDirect is running a new promotion for a 6.00% APY on all new money until April 30th.

Here are the details of this offer from the HSBCDirect website:

6.00% is a promotional Annual Percentage Yield (APY) available on New Money only between January 29, 2007 and April 30, 2007. Minimum balance to open an account is $1.00.

New Money Period is January 29, 2007 through April 30, 2007. Starting Balance means the available balance in your account as of the close of business on January 26, 2007. New Money means funds not previously held by any member of the HSBC Group deposited during the New Money Period less any withdrawals, and it excludes your Starting Balance as calculated below. New Money must be in available funds for the promotional rate to apply.

Opening New Account.
This offer has finally convinced me to go ahead and take the plunge, I just completed the online account application and need to wait for the trial deposits to my checking account. The application process was very straightforward and only took a few minutes to complete.

Once I receive the trial deposits in my checking account, I will return to the application process and verify the amount of each deposit and then my account will be active and ready to receive funds. As of right now, I have set my initial deposit to be $25.00 but the account only requires a minimum deposit of $1.00. While I wait for the trial deposits to be verified, I will initiate the process of transferring the funds at ING Direct into my checking account so I can then deposit those funds to HSBCDirect.

Challenge Myself.
As I mentioned in my post about setting up an automatic savings plan, I am going to challenge myself to increase my savings. With my ING Direct account, I have had a modest amount being automatically deposited once per week into my account.

Rather than simply cancel that automatic deposit and set one up at HSBCDirect, I am going to maintain my automatic savings plan with ING Direct and duplicate that at HSBCDirect. You may be asking why I would leave the current plan with ING Direct when they are paying a lower APY on savings.

The reason that I will leave the automatic deposit active with ING Direct is because they ran a very similar promotion last year at this time where all new deposits received an increased APY. So I will continue with this small deposit to ING Direct every week and hopefully they will come through with a similar offer this year. These offers seem to coincide with tax season as I am sure that they are hoping more and more people will deposit their tax refunds into their accounts.

Earning More Money.
It will be interesting to see how the HSBCDirect Online Savings Account compares to the Orange Savings Account with ING Direct. I’ll be paying close attention to details such as the ease of initiating a transfer, the time it takes to complete an incoming transfer and an outgoing transfer, as well as overall ease of use with the interface. I’ve been quite pleased with my ING Direct account with regard to those criteria so I will be using that as a comparison.

But in the end, I am excited to be a new customer with HSBCDirect and earning more interest on my money. The difference of 1.50% APY was just too large to ignore any further and this will provide me an opportunity to review HSBCDirect while also making a little more money.